Index: Doc/library/optparse.rst
===================================================================
--- Doc/library/optparse.rst	(revision 76557)
+++ Doc/library/optparse.rst	(working copy)
@@ -157,10 +157,24 @@
    an option that must be supplied on the command-line; note that the phrase
    "required option" is self-contradictory in English.  :mod:`optparse` doesn't
    prevent you from implementing required options, but doesn't give you much
-   help at it either.  See ``examples/required_1.py`` and
-   ``examples/required_2.py`` in the :mod:`optparse` source distribution for two
-   ways to implement required options with :mod:`optparse`.
+   help at it either.  For example, a simple implementation of required options
+   can be implemented as::
 
+     class OptionParser(optparse.OptionParser):
+    
+         def check_required (self, opt):
+             option = self.get_option(opt)
+            
+             # Assumes the option's 'default' is set to None!
+             if getattr(self.values, option.dest) is None:
+                 self.error("%s option not supplied" % option)
+    
+      parser = OptionParser()
+      parser.add_option("-f", "--file", default=None)
+      (options, args) = parser.parse_args()
+    
+      parser.check_required("-f")
+
 For example, consider this hypothetical command-line::
 
    prog -v --report /tmp/report.txt foo bar