cxz / tv

📺(tv) Tidy Viewer is a cross-platform CLI csv pretty printer that uses column styling to maximize viewer enjoyment.

Tidy Viewer (tv)

Tidy Viewer (tv) is a cross-platform csv pretty printer that uses column styling to maximize viewer enjoyment.

Pretty Printing

Installation

The following install options are available

1. Cargo Install from crates.io
2. Cargo Install from source
3. Linux Install
4. Debian .deb install
5. AUR install

1. Cargo Install

The following will install from the crates.io source. For convenience add the alas alias tv='tidy-viewer' to bashrc.

cargo install tidy-viewer
sudo cp /home/user/.cargo/bin/tidy-viewer /usr/local/bin/.
echo "alias tv='tidy-viewer'" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

2. Install from source

The current version is alpha. I do not plan to push to crates.io until this is more polished. If you would like to try this in its raw state install rust and follow the steps below.

1. Clone repo
2. cargo build --release
3. cp binary to bin
4. Add alias tv='tidy-viewer' to ~/.bashrc

git clone https://github.com/alexhallam/tv
cd tv
cargo build --release
sudo cp ./target/release/tidy-viewer /usr/local/bin/.
echo "alias tv='tidy-viewer'" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

3. Linux Install

wget https://github.com/alexhallam/tv/releases/download/0.0.10/tidy-viewer
chmod +x tidy-viewer
echo "alias tv='tidy-viewer'" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

4. Debian

git clone https://github.com/alexhallam/tv
cd tv
sudo dpkg -i target/debian/tidy-viewer_<version_number>_amd64.deb
echo "alias tv='tidy-viewer'" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

5. AUR

paru -S tidy-viewer

Examples

Have some fun with the following datasets!

Diamonds

# Download the diamonds data
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tidyverse/ggplot2/master/data-raw/diamonds.csv

# pipe to tv
cat diamonds.csv | tv

Starwars

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tidyverse/dplyr/master/data-raw/starwars.csv
cat starwars.csv | tv

Pigeon Racing

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/joanby/python-ml-course/master/datasets/pigeon-race/pigeon-racing.csv
cat pigeon-racing.csv | tv

Significant Figure Definitions & Rules

The first three digits represent > 99.9% the value of a number. -- GNU-R Pillar

tv uses the same significant figure (sigfig) rules that the R package pillar uses.

The purpose of the sigfig rules in tv is to guide the eye to the most important information in a number. This section defines terms and the decision tree used in the calculation of the final value displayed.

Definitions

     ┌─────┐      ┌─────┐     ─┐
     │     │      │     │      │
     │     │      │     │      │
     │     │      │     │      │
     │     │      │     │      │
     │     │  ┌┐  │     │      │
     └─────┘  └┘  └─────┘    ──┴─
   │        │    │                │
   └────────┘  ▲ └────────────────┘
left hand side │  right hand side
     (lhs)     │       (rhs)

            decimal

left hand side (lhs): digits on the left hand side of the decimal.

right hand side (rhs): digits on the right hand side of the decimal.

 ┌─────┐      ┌─────┐     ─┐     ┌─────┐
 │     │      │     │      │     │     │
 │     │      │     │      │     │     │
 │     │      │     │      │     │     │
 │     │      │     │      │     │     │
 │     │  ┌┐  │     │      │     │     │
 └─────┘  └┘  └─────┘    ──┴─    └─────┘

│                     │         │       │
└─────────────────────┘         └───────┘
       leading 0s              trailing 0s

leading 0s: 0s to the left of a non-zero.

trailing 0s: 0s to the right of a non-zero. The zeros in 500m are trailing as well as the 0s in 0.500km.

 ─┐     ┌─────┐       ─┐
  │     │     │        │
  │     │     │        │
  │     │     │        │
  │     │     │        │
  │     │     │  ┌┐    │
──┴─    └─────┘  └┘  ──┴─

                   │        │
                   └────────┘
              fractional digit(s)

fractional digits: Digits on the rhs of the decimal. The represent the non-integer part of a number.

Rules

There are only 4 outputs possible. The significant figures to display are set by the user. Assume sigfig = 3:

1. lhs only (12345.0 -> 12345): If no fractional digits are present and lhs >= sigfig then return lhs
2. lhs + point (1234.5 -> 1234.): If fractional digits are present and lhs >= sigfig then return lhs with point. This is to let the user know that some decimal dust is beyond the main mass of the number.
3. lhs + point + rhs (1.2345 -> 1.23): If fractional digits are present and lhs < sigfig return the first three digits of the number.
4. long rhs (0.00001 -> 0.00001): This is reserved for values with leading 0s in the rhs.

# Psuedo Code: Sigfig logic assuming sigfig = 3
if lhs == 0:
    n = ((floor(log10(abs(x))) + 1 - sigfig)
    r =(10^n) * round(x / (10^n))
    return r
    // (0.12345 -> 0.123)
else:
    if log10(lhs) + 1 > sigfig:
        if rhs > 0:
            //concatonate:
            //(lhs)
            //(point)
            //(123.45 -> 123.)
        else:
            //concatonate:
            //(lhs)
            //(1234.0 -> 1234)
            //(100.0 -> 100)
    else:
        //concatonate:
        //(lhs)
        //(point)
        //sigfig - log10(lhs) from rhs
        //(12.345 -> 12.3)
        //(1.2345 -> 1.23)

Tools to pair with tv

tv is a good compliment to command line data manipulation tools. I have listed some tools that I like to use with tv.

xsv - Command line csv data manipulation. Rust

csvtk - Command line csv data manipulation. Go

tsv-utils - Command line csv data manipulation toolkit. D

q - Command line csv data manipulation query-like. Python

miller - Command line data manipulation, statistics, and more. C

Tools similar to tv

column Comes standard with linux. To get similar functionality run column file.csv -ts,

Though column is similar I do think there are some reasons tv is a better tool.

1. NA comprehension

NA values are very important! Viewers should have their attention drawn to these empty cells. In the image below NA values are not only invisible, but it seems to be causing incorrect alignment in other columns.

2. Column Overflow Logic

In cases where the terminal width can't fit all of the columns in a dataframe, column will try to smush data on the rows below. This results in an unpleasant viewing experience.

tv can automatically tell when there will be too many columns to print. When this occurs it will only print the columns that fit in the terminal and mention the extras in the footer below the table.

Inspiration

pillar - R's tibble like formatting. Fantastic original work by Kirill Müller and Hadley Wickham. tv makes an attempt to port their ideas to the terminal.