Feature request: allow downloading fresh version of exercise

Exercism Support CLI
1

The result would be something like a --fresh flag that, in combination with --force, would overwrite user-modified files with the original files to be filled in, or just --fresh alone when re-downloading an exercise.

The problem I’m having is that when an exercise is updated via the website and I exercism download --force ... it to get the latest Markdown and text files, the CLI doesn’t touch my solution files, because

Download an exercise.

You may download an exercise to work on. If you’ve already
started working on it, the command will also download your
latest solution.

which means I can’t even delete the exercise folder and redownload everything.

2

Do you want to lose your prior solution? You can download the blank solution file using something like:

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/exercism/${track}/refs/heads/main/exercises/practice/${exercise}/${exercise}.${extension}.

3

You also can reset the exercise to the initial state using the website. It’s hidden in the 3-dot menu of the online editor (“Reset to exercise start”), so you add a step after updating the exercise to reset it in the online editor.

4

I have a subcommand for this in my exercism wrapper, but I have only used it a couple of times. I would question whether it’s a good fit to be added into the CLI.

There is an API for it: /solutions/$UUID/initial_files

Probably your quickest way is to get them from GitHub.

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