Awesome CLI Apps

A curated list of command line apps.

Inspired by the awesome list thing.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents generated with DocToc

• Entertainment
  • Video
• Web Development
• Database
• Productivity
• Utilities
  • OS X
• Command Line Tools
• Data Manipulation
• Files and Directories
  • Deletion
  • Files
  • Directories
  • Directory Navigation
• Version Control
  • Git
  • Changelogs
• Images
  • Gif Creation
• SVG
• Text Manipulation
• Screensavers
• Graphics
• Resources
  • Node frameworks and packages
  • Node Command-line utilities
  • String Manipulation
• Other
• License

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Entertainment

• cmus - Small, fast and powerful console music player for Unix-like operating systems.
• Instant-Music-Downloader - Instant music downloader.
• itunes-remote - It’s about listening to music without leaving the terminal. OS X only.
• pianobar - Pandora client.
• TTYtter - Twitter client- (original).
• quote-cli - Get a random quote or the quote of the day in your CLI.

Video

• youtube-dl - a small command-line program to download videos from YouTube.com and a few more sites. You can install with brew install youtube-dl.

Web Development

• bower-name-cli - Check whether a package name is available on bower.
• caniuse-cmd - Searches caniuse.com about browser support of feature.
• is-up-cli - Check whether a website is up or down.
• npm-name-cli - Check whether a package name is available on npm.
• npm-user-cli - Get user info of a npm user.
• pageres-cli - Capture website screenshots.
• strip-css-comments-cli - Strip comments from CSS.
• viewport-list-cli - Return a list of devices and their viewports.
• surge - deploy directory to the web.
• acmetool - An easy-to-use command line tool for automatically acquiring certificates from ACME servers.

Database

• mycli - A Terminal Client for MySQL with AutoCompletion and Syntax Highlighting.

Productivity

• AutoScreenshotUploader- Instantly capture and upload screenshot to imgur.
• doing - A command line tool for keeping track of what you’re doing and tracking what you’ve done.
• ffscreencast- ffmpeg screencast with video overlay and multi monitor support.
• idea- A lightweight CLI tool and module for keeping ideas in a safe place quick and easy.
• imgur-uploader-cli- Upload images to imgur.
• geeknote- Console client for Evernote.
• ledger - Powerful, double-entry accounting system that is accessed from the UNIX command-line.
• The Mutt E-Mail Client - Email client.
• Taskwarrior - Free and Open Source Software that manages your TODO list from your command line.
• Timetrap- Simple command line timetracker.

Utilities

• archive-type-cli - Detect the archive type of a Buffer/Uint8Array.
• battery-level - Get current battery level.
• brightness-cli - Change screen brightness- windows version.
• file-type-cli - Detect the file type of a file or stdin.
• screensaver - Start the screensaver.
• wallpaper-ci - Get or set the desktop wallpaper.
• yank - Yank terminal output to clipboard.
• text-meme - Generate text meme.

OS X

• bundle-id-cli - Get bundle identifier from a bundle name (OS X): Safari → com.apple.Safari.
• bundle-name-cli - Get bundle name from a bundle identifier (OS X): com.apple.Safari → Safari.
• lnfs-cli - Safely force create symlinks.
• osx-version-cli - Get the OS X version of the current system.
• osx-wifi-cli - A cli for managing wifi connections on OSX.

Command Line Tools

• The Fuck- Magnificent app which corrects your previous console command.
• happyfinder- (another) Fuzzy file finder for the command line.
• PathPicker - After parsing the output from a command, PathPicker presents you with a nice UI to select which files you're interested in.
• tldr- Simplified and community-driven man pages.

Data Manipulation

• jq - Command-line JSON processor http://stedolan.github.io/jq/.
• underscore-cli - Command-line utility-belt for hacking JSON and Javascript.

Files and Directories

Deletion

• trash-cli - Move files and directories to the trash.
• empty-trash-cli - Empty the trash.
• trashss - ( only) Trash screenshots on desktop.
• del-cli - Delete files and folders.

Files

• strip-json-comments-cli - Strip comments from JSON. Lets you use comments in your JSON files!
• DocToc - Generates table of contents for markdown files inside local git repository. Links are compatible with anchors generated by github or other sites.

Directories

• find-up-cli - Find a file by walking up parent directories.

Directory Navigation

• autojump - A cd command that learns - easily navigate directories from the command line- https://github.com/wting/autojump/wiki.
• fasd - Command-line productivity booster, offers quick access to files and directories, inspired by autojump, z and v.
• j - semi clone of autojump (https://github.com/wting/autojump) in shell/awk.
• pm - The easy way to switch to your projects on the shell.
• z - z is the new j, yo.

Version Control

Git

• CLI GitHub - 📺 A fancy GitHub client for command line.
• Gistup - Create a gist from terminal, then use git to update it.
• git commander - A git tool with a easy terminal interface.
• git-stats - 🍀 A GitHub-like contributions calendar, but locally, with all your git commits.
• hub - A command-line wrapper for git that makes you better at GitHub.
• dev-time - Get the current local time of a GitHub user.

Changelogs

• clog - A conventional changelog for the rest of us.

Images

Gif Creation

• gifsicle - Create, manipulate, and optimize GIF images and animations.
• ttygif - Convert terminal recordings to animated gifs.
• ttygif - ttyrec to gif.
• ttystudio - A terminal-to-gif recorder minus the headaches.
• asciinema - Terminal session recorder and the best companion of asciinema.org.

SVG

• SVGO- SVG Optimizer is a Nodejs-based tool for optimizing SVG vector graphics files.

Text Manipulation

• parse-columns-cli - Parse text columns, like the output of unix commands. Returns JSON that you can manipulate with tools like jq or underscore-cli.

Screensavers

• cmatrix - Show a scrolling 'Matrix' like screen- (original).
• pipes.sh - Shows random pipes that grow across the screen.

Graphics

• cli-mandelbrot - A cli for traversing the Mandelbrot fractal.
• WOPR - A simple markup language for creating rich terminal reports, presentations and infographics.
• sparkly-cli - Generate sparklines ▁▂▃▅▂▇..

Resources

Some fine resources to write your own CLI App.

Node frameworks and packages

• meow - The most simple way to write small CLI modules including argument parsing.
• inquirer - A collection of common interactive command line user interfaces like checkboxes, radio buttons etc. with a simple but powerful API.
• Vorpal - Complete solution for creating interactive apps. Includes UI features from inquirer.

Node Command-line utilities

• Chalk - Beautiful API to have beautiful terminal string styling.
• log-symbols - Colored symbols to differentiate output messages with a blink of an eye.
• log-update – Useful for ASCII animation. For example loading indicators.

String Manipulation

• indent-string-cli - Indent each line in a string.
• pretty-ms-cli - Convert milliseconds to a human readable string: 1337000000 → 15d 11h 23m 20s.
• repeating-cli - Repeat a string - fast.
• string-width-cli - Get the visual width of a string - the number of columns required to display it.
• find-versions-cli - Find semver versions in a string: unicorn v1.2.3 → 1.2.3.
• pretty-bytes-cli - Convert bytes to a human readable string: 1337 → 1.34 kB.

Other

• app-path-cli - Get the path to an app (OS X).
• Bible.Js CLI client - 📖 Bible.JS CLI client. Read the Holy Bible via the command line.
• birthday - Know when a friend's birthday is coming.
• cowsay and cowthink - You can install with homebrew.
• detect-indent-cli - Detect the indentation of code.
• fortune - Shows a random fortune.
• fullname-cli - Get the fullname of the current user.
• get-port-cli - Get an available port.
• gzip-size-cli - Get the gzipped size of a file or stdin.
• HASHA -cli - Hashing made simple. Get the hash of text or stdin.
• is-reachable-cli - Check if hostnames are reachable or not.
• kill-tabs - Kill all Chrome tabs to improve performance, decrease battery usage, and save memory.
• leven-cli - Measure the difference between two strings using the Levenshtein distance algorithm.
• open-shortcut-cli - Open the URL from a web shortcut file in the browser.
• pkg-dir-cli - Find the root directory of a npm package.
• speed-test - Test your internet connection speed and ping using speedtest.net from the CLI.
• shortcut-url-cli - Get the URL from a web shortcut file.
• SpeedRead - A simple terminal-based open source Spritz-alike.
• to-double-quotes - Convert matching single-quotes to double-quotes: I 'love' unicorns => I "love" unicorns.
• to-single-quotes - Convert matching double-quotes to single-quotes: I "love" unicorns → I 'love' unicorns.
• yosay - Like cowsay, but for yeoman.
• gdb-dashboard - Modular visual interface for GDB in Python.
• weather-cli - Check the weather for your city from your terminal.

License

To the extent possible under law, Adam Harris has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this work.