Is there a variant of cat that outputs syntax-highlighted lines of code when used on a source file?
An idea: maybe vi[m] or another editor can be asked to dump the syntax-highlighted contents of said files to stdout and exit immediately?
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5 Answers
Passing the file through pygmentize-f terminal will attempt to detect the type from the filename and highlight it appropriately.
answered Aug 26, 2011 at 2:42
Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams
46.9k7 gold badges97 silver badges102 bronze badges
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Is that the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine font in their logo? If it is that's awesome.amphetamachine– amphetamachine2011-08-26 03:57:15 +00:00Commented Aug 26, 2011 at 3:57
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2Available as package
python-pygmentson Debian.enzotib– enzotib2011-08-26 07:57:10 +00:00Commented Aug 26, 2011 at 7:57 -
8I found
alias pcat="pygmentize -f terminal256 -O style=native -g"to be a nice solutionMikael Öhman– Mikael Öhman2012-12-26 07:51:58 +00:00Commented Dec 26, 2012 at 7:51 -
1also available via
pip install pygmentscraigb– craigb2013-11-08 20:59:30 +00:00Commented Nov 8, 2013 at 20:59 -
1Actually it must be
cat code.extension | pygmentize -f terminal -l extension.fiatjaf– fiatjaf2015-04-16 21:34:30 +00:00Commented Apr 16, 2015 at 21:34
The Source-highlight package is shipped with the esc.outlang output language definition, which highlights with ANSI escape sequences.
A handy wrapper src-hilite-lesspipe.sh is also included in the package, so displaying highlighted output in the terminal is just src-hilite-lesspipe.sh source.file.
Actually src-hilite-lesspipe.sh's primary reason is to help automating the use of source-highlight with less. You just set:
export LESSOPEN="| /path/to/src-hilite-lesspipe.sh %s"
export LESS=' -R '
Then any less source.file will show highlighted source code. (Code in unknown language will pass through unaltered. Highlighting will be also skipped in case of redirected content, like less < source.file.)
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Nice, thank you for taking the time to write up this answerPaolo– Paolo2011-11-05 07:39:36 +00:00Commented Nov 5, 2011 at 7:39
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I like this idea to use my existing Vim highlighting, just wish the utility worked on all *nix and was available for MacOS via Homebrew!Cameron Flint– Cameron Flint2020-03-29 00:40:50 +00:00Commented Mar 29, 2020 at 0:40
Based on @Mikael Öhman's comment on @Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams's answer, I wrote this Python program to use pygments if possible or else use cat.
#! /usr/bin/env python3
from argparse import ArgumentParser
import subprocess
import os
import os.path
def main():
parser = ArgumentParser(description='cat alternative that uses ANSI characters')
parser.add_argument('file', help='the file to print out the contents of', type=str)
args = parser.parse_args()
if not os.path.isfile(args.file):
parser.error(f'file not found: {args.file}')
cat = False
result = subprocess.run(('pygmentize -f terminal256 -O style=native ' + args.file).split(), stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
stderr=subprocess.PIPE,
)
if result.stderr:
cat = True
commands = {
True: 'cat ',
False: 'pygmentize -f terminal256 -O style=native '
}
os.system(commands[cat] + args.file)
if __name__ == '__main__':
main()
