[Feature]: let cli-client program() accept parsed arguments #43938

Problem

playwright-cli.js in microsoft/playwright-cli must know the command name before it calls program() from playwright-core/lib/tools/cli-client/program, because it checks for updates only for some commands. At the moment it finds the command with its own simple parser, and this parser can take a session name as the command (microsoft/playwright-cli#505).

microsoft/playwright-cli#521 fixes this, but it loads minimist.js and help.json from the internal files of playwright-core and copies the list of boolean options. Then program() parses the same arguments a second time.

Proposal

In packages/playwright-core/src/tools/cli-client/program.ts:

• Move the minimist call and the -s → session and -g → global changes out of program() into a new exported function parseArgs(argv: string[]): MinimistArgs.
• Add an optional args to the options of program(): program(options?: { args?: MinimistArgs, embedderVersion?: string }). When args is not set, program() parses process.argv.slice(2) as it does now, so the current callers continue to work.

Expected result: parseArgs(['-s', 'list', 'snapshot']) returns { _: ['snapshot'], session: 'list' }.

Follow-up in microsoft/playwright-cli

After a release, playwright-cli.js can parse the arguments one time:

const { program, parseArgs } = require('playwright-core/lib/tools/cli-client/program');

const args = parseArgs(process.argv.slice(2));
await checkForUpdates(args._[0]).catch(() => {});
program({ args, embedderVersion: packageJson.version });

program() changes args while it runs (for example in attach and runInSession), so the embedder must read what it needs before it calls program().