2 <img src="doc/logo-header.svg" alt="bat - a cat clone with wings"><br>
3 <a href="https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/actions?query=workflow%3ACICD"><img src="https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/workflows/CICD/badge.svg" alt="Build Status"></a>
4 <img src="https://img.shields.io/crates/l/bat.svg" alt="license">
5 <a href="https://crates.io/crates/bat"><img src="https://img.shields.io/crates/v/bat.svg?colorB=319e8c" alt="Version info"></a><br>
6 A <i>cat(1)</i> clone with syntax highlighting and Git integration.
10 <a href="#syntax-highlighting">Key Features</a> •
11 <a href="#how-to-use">How To Use</a> •
12 <a href="#installation">Installation</a> •
13 <a href="#customization">Customization</a> •
14 <a href="#project-goals-and-alternatives">Project goals, alternatives</a><br>
15 [<a href="https://github.com/chinanf-boy/bat-zh">中文</a>] [<a href="doc/README-ja.md">日本語</a>] [<a href="doc/README-ko.md">한국어</a>] [<a href="doc/README-ru.md">Русский</a>]
18### Syntax highlighting
20`bat` supports syntax highlighting for a large number of programming and markup
23
27`bat` communicates with `git` to show modifications with respect to the index
30
32### Show non-printable characters
34You can use the `-A`/`--show-all` option to show and highlight non-printable
37
41`bat` can pipe its own output to a pager (e.g `less`) if the output is too large for one screen.
45Oh.. you can also use it to concatenate files :wink:. Whenever
46`bat` detects a non-interactive terminal (i.e. when you pipe into another process
47or into a file), `bat` will act as a drop-in replacement for `cat` and
48fall back to printing the plain file contents.
52Display a single file on the terminal
58Display multiple files at once
64Read from stdin, determine the syntax automatically (note, highlighting will
65only work if the syntax can be determined from the first line of the file,
66usually through a shebang such as `#!/bin/sh`)
69> curl -s https://sh.rustup.rs | bat
72Read from stdin, specify the language explicitly
75> yaml2json .travis.yml | json_pp | bat -l json
78Show and highlight non-printable characters:
83Use it as a `cat` replacement:
86bat > note.md # quickly create a new file
88bat header.md content.md footer.md > document.md
90bat -n main.rs # show line numbers (only)
92bat f - g # output 'f', then stdin, then 'g'.
95### Integration with other tools
99You can use the `-exec` option of `find` to preview all search results with `bat`:
104If you happen to use [`fd`](https://github.com/sharkdp/fd), you can use the `-X`/`--exec-batch` option to do the same:
111With [`batgrep`](https://github.com/eth-p/bat-extras/blob/master/doc/batgrep.md), `bat` can be used as the printer for [`ripgrep`](https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep) search results.
119`bat` can be combined with `tail -f` to continuously monitor a given file with syntax highlighting.
121tail -f /var/log/pacman.log | bat --paging=never -l log
123Note that we have to switch off paging in order for this to work. We have also specified the syntax
124explicitly (`-l log`), as it can not be auto-detected in this case.
128You can combine `bat` with `git show` to view an older version of a given file with proper syntax
131git show v0.6.0:src/main.rs | bat -l rs
134Note that syntax highlighting within diffs is currently not supported. If you are looking for this, check out [`delta`](https://github.com/dandavison/delta).
138The line numbers and Git modification markers in the output of `bat` can make it hard to copy
139the contents of a file. To prevent this, you can call `bat` with the `-p`/`--plain` option or
140simply pipe the output into `xclip`:
144`bat` will detect that the output is being redirected and print the plain file contents.
148`bat` can be used as a colorizing pager for `man`, by setting the
149`MANPAGER` environment variable:
152export MANPAGER="sh -c 'col -bx | bat -l man -p'"
156It might also be necessary to set `MANROFFOPT="-c"` if you experience
159If you prefer to have this bundled in a new command, you can also use [`batman`](https://github.com/eth-p/bat-extras/blob/master/doc/batman.md).
161Note that the [Manpage syntax](assets/syntaxes/02_Extra/Manpage.sublime-syntax) is developed in this repository and still needs some work.
163Also, note that this will [not work](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/issues/1145) with Mandocs `man` implementation.
165#### `prettier` / `shfmt` / `rustfmt`
167The [`prettybat`](https://github.com/eth-p/bat-extras/blob/master/doc/prettybat.md) script is a wrapper that will format code and print it with `bat`.
172[](https://repology.org/project/bat/versions)
174### On Ubuntu (using `apt`)
175*... and other Debian-based Linux distributions.*
177`bat` is making its way through the [Ubuntu](https://packages.ubuntu.com/eoan/bat) and
178[Debian](https://packages.debian.org/sid/bat) package release process, and is available
179for Ubuntu as of Eoan 19.10. On Debian `bat` is currently only available on the unstable
182If your Ubuntu/Debian installation is new enough you can simply run:
188If you install `bat` this way, please note that the executable may be installed as `batcat` instead of `bat` (due to [a name
189clash with another package](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/issues/982)). You can set up a `bat -> batcat` symlink or alias to prevent any issues that may come up because of this and to be consistent with other distributions:
192ln -s /usr/bin/batcat ~/.local/bin/bat
195### On Ubuntu (using most recent `.deb` packages)
196*... and other Debian-based Linux distributions.*
198If the package has not yet been promoted to your Ubuntu/Debian installation, or you want
199the most recent release of `bat`, download the latest `.deb` package from the
200[release page](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/releases) and install it via:
203sudo dpkg -i bat_0.16.0_amd64.deb # adapt version number and architecture
208You can install [the `bat` package](https://pkgs.alpinelinux.org/packages?name=bat)
209from the official sources, provided you have the appropriate repository enabled:
217You can install [the `bat` package](https://www.archlinux.org/packages/community/x86_64/bat/)
218from the official sources:
226You can install [the `bat` package](https://koji.fedoraproject.org/koji/packageinfo?packageID=27506) from the official [Fedora Modular](https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/modularity/using-modules/) repository.
234You can install [the `bat` package](https://packages.gentoo.org/packages/sys-apps/bat)
235from the official sources:
243You can install `bat` via xbps-install:
250You can install a precompiled [`bat` package](https://www.freshports.org/textproc/bat) with pkg:
256or build it on your own from the FreeBSD ports:
259cd /usr/ports/textproc/bat
265You can install `bat` using the [nix package manager](https://nixos.org/nix):
273You can install `bat` with zypper:
279### On macOS (or Linux) via Homebrew
281You can install `bat` with [Homebrew on MacOS](https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/bat) or [Homebrew on Linux](https://formulae.brew.sh/formula-linux/bat):
287### On macOS via MacPorts
289Or install `bat` with [MacPorts](https://ports.macports.org/port/bat/summary):
297There are a few options to install `bat` on Windows. Once you have installed `bat`,
298take a look at the ["Using `bat` on Windows"](#using-bat-on-windows) section.
302You will need to install the [Visual C++ Redistributable](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2977003/the-latest-supported-visual-c-downloads) package.
306You can install `bat` via [Chocolatey](https://chocolatey.org/packages/Bat):
313You can install `bat` via [scoop](https://scoop.sh/):
318#### From prebuilt binaries:
320You can download prebuilt binaries from the [Release page](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/releases),
322You will need to install the [Visual C++ Redistributable](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2977003/the-latest-supported-visual-c-downloads) package.
326Check out the [Release page](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/releases) for
327prebuilt versions of `bat` for many different architectures. Statically-linked
328binaries are also available: look for archives with `musl` in the file name.
332If you want to build `bat` from source, you need Rust 1.40 or
333higher. You can then use `cargo` to build everything:
336cargo install --locked bat
339Note that additional files like the man page or shell completion
340files can not be installed in this way. They will be generated by `cargo` and should be available in the cargo target folder (under `build`).
344### Highlighting theme
346Use `bat --list-themes` to get a list of all available themes for syntax
347highlighting. To select the `TwoDark` theme, call `bat` with the
348`--theme=TwoDark` option or set the `BAT_THEME` environment variable to
349`TwoDark`. Use `export BAT_THEME="TwoDark"` in your shell's startup file to
350make the change permanent. Alternatively, use `bat`s
351[configuration file](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat#configuration-file).
353If you want to preview the different themes on a custom file, you can use
354the following command (you need [`fzf`](https://github.com/junegunn/fzf) for this):
356bat --list-themes | fzf --preview="bat --theme={} --color=always /path/to/file"
359`bat` looks good on a dark background by default. However, if your terminal uses a
360light background, some themes like `GitHub` or `OneHalfLight` will work better for you.
361You can also use a custom theme by following the
362['Adding new themes' section below](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat#adding-new-themes).
366`bat` has four themes that always use [8-bit colors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANSI_escape_code#Colors),
367even when truecolor support is available:
369- `ansi-dark` looks decent on any terminal with a dark background. It uses 3-bit colors: black, red,
370 green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan, and white.
371- `ansi-light` is like `ansi-dark`, but for terminals with a light background.
372- `base16` is designed for [base16](https://github.com/chriskempson/base16) terminal themes. It uses
373 4-bit colors (3-bit colors plus bright variants) in accordance with the
374 [base16 styling guidelines](https://github.com/chriskempson/base16/blob/master/styling.md).
375- `base16-256` is designed for [base16-shell](https://github.com/chriskempson/base16-shell).
376 It replaces certain bright colors with 8-bit colors from 16 to 21. **Do not** use this simply
377 because you have a 256-color terminal but are not using base16-shell.
379Although these themes are more restricted, they have two advantages over truecolor themes:
381- They harmonize better with other terminal software using 3-bit or 4-bit colors.
382- When you change your terminal theme, `bat` output already on the screen will update to match.
386You can use the `--style` option to control the appearance of `bat`s output.
387You can use `--style=numbers,changes`, for example, to show only Git changes
388and line numbers but no grid and no file header. Set the `BAT_STYLE` environment
389variable to make these changes permanent or use `bat`s
390[configuration file](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat#configuration-file).
392### Adding new syntaxes / language definitions
394Should you find that a particular syntax is not available within `bat`, you can follow these
395instructions to easily add new syntaxes to your current `bat` installation.
397`bat` uses the excellent [`syntect`](https://github.com/trishume/syntect/)
398library for syntax highlighting. `syntect` can read any
399[Sublime Text `.sublime-syntax` file](https://www.sublimetext.com/docs/3/syntax.html)
402A good resource for finding Sublime Syntax packages is [Package Control](https://packagecontrol.io/). Once you found a
4051. Create a folder with syntax definition files:
408 mkdir -p "$(bat --config-dir)/syntaxes"
409 cd "$(bat --config-dir)/syntaxes"
411 # Put new '.sublime-syntax' language definition files
412 # in this folder (or its subdirectories), for example:
413 git clone https://github.com/tellnobody1/sublime-purescript-syntax
4162. Now use the following command to parse these files into a binary cache:
4223. Finally, use `bat --list-languages` to check if the new languages are available.
424 If you ever want to go back to the default settings, call:
4304. If you think that a specific syntax should be included in `bat` by default, please
431 consider opening a "syntax request" ticket after reading the policies and
432 instructions [here](doc/assets.md): [Open Syntax Request](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat/issues/new?labels=syntax-request&template=syntax_request.md).
436This works very similar to how we add new syntax definitions.
438First, create a folder with the new syntax highlighting themes:
440mkdir -p "$(bat --config-dir)/themes"
441cd "$(bat --config-dir)/themes"
443# Download a theme in '.tmTheme' format, for example:
444git clone https://github.com/greggb/sublime-snazzy
446# Update the binary cache
450Finally, use `bat --list-themes` to check if the new themes are available.
452### Adding or changing file type associations
454You can add new (or change existing) file name patterns using the `--map-syntax`
455command line option. The option takes an argument of the form `pattern:syntax` where
456`pattern` is a glob pattern that is matched against the file name and
457the absolute file path. The `syntax` part is the full name of a supported language
458(use `bat --list-languages` for an overview)full .
460Note: You probably want to use this option as an entry in `bat`s configuration file instead
461of passing it on the command line (see below).
463Example: To use "INI" syntax highlighting for all files with a `.conf` file extension, use
465--map-syntax='*.conf:INI'
468Example: To open all files called `.ignore` (exact match) with the "Git Ignore" syntax, use:
470--map-syntax='.ignore:Git Ignore'
473Example: To open all `.conf` files in subfolders of `/etc/apache2` with the "Apache Conf"
474syntax, use (this mapping is already built in):
476-map-syntax='/etc/apache2/**/*.conf:Apache Conf'
479### Using a different pager
481`bat` uses the pager that is specified in the `PAGER` environment variable. If this variable is not
482set, `less` is used by default. If you want to use a different pager, you can either modify the
483`PAGER` variable or set the `BAT_PAGER` environment variable to override what is specified in
486If you want to pass command-line arguments to the pager, you can also set them via the
487`PAGER`/`BAT_PAGER` variables:
490export BAT_PAGER="less -RF"
493Instead of using environment variables, you can also use `bat`s [configuration file](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat#configuration-file) to configure the pager (`--pager` option).
495**Note**: By default, if the pager is set to `less` (and no command-line options are specified),
496`bat` will pass the following command line options to the pager: `-R`/`--RAW-CONTROL-CHARS`,
497`-F`/`--quit-if-one-screen` and `-X`/`--no-init`. The last option (`-X`) is only used for `less`
498versions older than 530.
500The `-R` option is needed to interpret ANSI colors correctly. The second option (`-F`) instructs
501less to exit immediately if the output size is smaller than the vertical size of the terminal.
502This is convenient for small files because you do not have to press `q` to quit the pager. The
503third option (`-X`) is needed to fix a bug with the `--quit-if-one-screen` feature in old versions
504of `less`. Unfortunately, it also breaks mouse-wheel support in `less`.
506If you want to enable mouse-wheel scrolling on older versions of `less`, you can pass just `-R` (as
507in the example above, this will disable the quit-if-one-screen feature). For less 530 or newer,
508it should work out of the box.
512`bat` expands tabs to 4 spaces by itself, not relying on the pager. To change this, simply add the
513`--tabs` argument with the number of spaces you want to be displayed.
515**Note**: Defining tab stops for the pager (via the `--pager` argument by `bat`, or via the `LESS`
516environment variable for `less`) won't be taken into account because the pager will already get
517expanded spaces instead of tabs. This behaviour is added to avoid indentation issues caused by the
518sidebar. Calling `bat` with `--tabs=0` will override it and let tabs be consumed by the pager.
522If you make use of the dark mode feature in macOS, you might want to configure `bat` to use a different
523theme based on the OS theme. The following snippet uses the `default` theme when in the _dark mode_
524and the `GitHub` theme when in the _light mode_.
527alias cat="bat --theme=\$(defaults read -globalDomain AppleInterfaceStyle &> /dev/null && echo default || echo GitHub)"
533`bat` can also be customized with a configuration file. The location of the file is dependent
534on your operating system. To get the default path for your system, call
539Alternatively, you can use the `BAT_CONFIG_PATH` environment variable to point `bat` to a
540non-default location of the configuration file:
542export BAT_CONFIG_PATH="/path/to/bat.conf"
545A default configuration file can be created with the `--generate-config-file` option.
547bat --generate-config-file
552The configuration file is a simple list of command line arguments. Use `bat --help` to see a full list of possible options and values. In addition, you can add comments by prepending a line with the `#` character.
554Example configuration file:
556# Set the theme to "TwoDark"
559# Show line numbers, Git modifications and file header (but no grid)
560--style="numbers,changes,header"
562# Use italic text on the terminal (not supported on all terminals)
565# Use C++ syntax for .ino files
566--map-syntax "*.ino:C++"
569## Using `bat` on Windows
571`bat` mostly works out-of-the-box on Windows, but a few features may need extra configuration.
575You will need to install the [Visual C++ Redistributable](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2977003/the-latest-supported-visual-c-downloads) package.
579Windows only includes a very limited pager in the form of `more`. You can download a Windows binary
580for `less` [from its homepage](http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/download.html) or [through
581Chocolatey](https://chocolatey.org/packages/Less). To use it, place the binary in a directory in
582your `PATH` or [define an environment variable](#using-a-different-pager). The [Chocolatey package](#on-windows) installs `less` automatically.
586Windows 10 natively supports colors in both `conhost.exe` (Command Prompt) and PowerShell since
587[v1511](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_10_version_history#Version_1511_(November_Update)), as
588well as in newer versions of bash. On earlier versions of Windows, you can use
589[Cmder](http://cmder.net/), which includes [ConEmu](https://conemu.github.io/).
591**Note:** The Git and MSYS versions of `less` do not correctly interpret colors on Windows. If you
592don’t have any other pagers installed, you can disable paging entirely by passing `--paging=never`
593or by setting `BAT_PAGER` to an empty string.
597`bat` on Windows does not natively support Cygwin's unix-style paths (`/cygdrive/*`). When passed an absolute cygwin path as an argument, `bat` will encounter the following error: `The system cannot find the path specified. (os error 3)`
599This can be solved by creating a wrapper or adding the following function to your `.bash_profile` file:
605 for index in $(seq 0 ${#args[@]}) ; do
606 case "${args[index]}" in
608 *) [ -e "${args[index]}" ] && args[index]="$(cygpath --windows "${args[index]}")";;
611 command bat "${args[@]}"
617### Terminals & colors
619`bat` handles terminals *with* and *without* truecolor support. However, the colors in most syntax
620highlighting themes are not optimized for 8-bit colors. It is therefore strongly recommended
621that you use a terminal with 24-bit truecolor support (`terminator`, `konsole`, `iTerm2`, ...),
622or use one of the basic [8-bit themes](#8-bit-themes) designed for a restricted set of colors.
623See [this article](https://gist.github.com/XVilka/8346728) for more details and a full list of
624terminals with truecolor support.
626Make sure that your truecolor terminal sets the `COLORTERM` variable to either `truecolor` or
627`24bit`. Otherwise, `bat` will not be able to determine whether or not 24-bit escape sequences
628are supported (and fall back to 8-bit colors).
630### Line numbers and grid are hardly visible
632Please try a different theme (see `bat --list-themes` for a list). The `OneHalfDark` and
633`OneHalfLight` themes provide grid and line colors that are brighter.
637`bat` natively supports UTF-8 as well as UTF-16. For every other file encoding, you may need to
638convert to UTF-8 first because the encodings can typically not be auto-detected. You can `iconv`
640Example: if you have a PHP file in Latin-1 (ISO-8859-1) encoding, you can call:
642iconv -f ISO-8859-1 -t UTF-8 my-file.php | bat
644Note: you might have to use the `-l`/`--language` option if the syntax can not be auto-detected
650# Recursive clone to retrieve all submodules
651git clone --recursive https://github.com/sharkdp/bat
653# Build (debug version)
657# Run unit tests and integration tests
660# Install (release version)
661cargo install --path . --locked
663# Build a bat binary with modified syntaxes and themes
665cargo install --path . --locked --force
670- [sharkdp](https://github.com/sharkdp)
671- [eth-p](https://github.com/eth-p)
672- [keith-hall](https://github.com/keith-hall)
674## Project goals and alternatives
676`bat` tries to achieve the following goals:
678- Provide beautiful, advanced syntax highlighting
679- Integrate with Git to show file modifications
680- Be a drop-in replacement for (POSIX) `cat`
681- Offer a user-friendly command-line interface
683There are a lot of alternatives, if you are looking for similar programs. See
684[this document](doc/alternatives.md) for a comparison.
687Copyright (c) 2018-2020 [bat-developers](https://github.com/sharkdp/bat).
689`bat` is made available under the terms of either the MIT License or the Apache License 2.0, at your option.
691See the [LICENSE-APACHE](LICENSE-APACHE) and [LICENSE-MIT](LICENSE-MIT) files for license details.
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