Installation

$ gem install ansi-select

Usage

There are two options:

• A standalone executable. Lines passed to STDIN will form your options. The result will be printed to STDOUT.

echo some words to choose from | tr ' ' '\n' | ansi-select

cd $(ls -d */ | ansi-select) # Go to a visually selected subdirectory.
git checkout $(git branch | ansi-select) # The same, but with git branches.

rm -r $(ls | ansi-select --multi) # Delete all the selected files.

• A Ruby library.

require "ansi/selector"

beverage = Ansi::Selector.select(["coffee", "tee"])

puts "Would you like some additions?"
additions = Ansi::Selector.multi_select(["sugar", "cream", "milk"])

print "Here's your #{beverage}. "
print "We've also added #{additions.join(', ')}." if additions.present?

The Ruby interface has an additional benefit of accepting and returning any objects instead of strings. Also, if you'd like a custom formatter for them, you can pass it as a second option (the default one calls #to_s):

Ansi::Selector.select(objects, ->(object) { "❤❤❤#{object}❤❤❤" })

Keyboard

• Up and down arrows or j/k to move around.
• Return to choose.
• Space to toggle in multi select mode.
• Ctrl-c or q to quit.