colt is a tool for getting terminal color codes. It uses a trivial syntax; aims to be similar to tput for terminals. Embed colt in shell scripts for maximum effect.

go get github.com/erikh/colt

Pass a color to colt in a shell to print its terminal definition ("escape code"), like so:

#!/bin/bash
echo "$(colt red)This is red text! $(colt blue on white)This is blue with a white background!"

There are three positions in the grammar that are relevant:

Foreground is always in the first position. Specify white if you want to stick to standard text.

If you want to specify a background, specify it or use "on" to specify it with a bit more of an english twist.

If you want to specify text attributes such as bold, underline, etc, specify them with "with", such as:

colt red with bold underline
colt red on white with bold

"Hi" colors, or colors with slightly more on bits switched on are brighter colors (and also, subject to different rules on older terminals WRT backgrounds, so read up about that). These colors start with hi such as hired or hiwhite.

All the keywords are here.

Erik Hollensbe github@hollensbe.org

MIT