Re:Bat: Cat with Syntax Highlighting
by hnlmorg on Wednesday October 08, 2025 @03:25AM
(#45513113)
Is it any different to remembering all the flags you’ve just used in bat?
Either way, you’d probably rely on either a capable shell’s autocomplete, or shell aliases. Or both.
I’m not trying to dismiss the usefulness of bat, I use it myself. But there’s also a lot of times i don’t have the luxury of installing bat (eg servers, or when working in highly regulated industries where you can only install software from a predefined list of approved packages) and I and others manage just fine.
My point is that the UNIX command line is extremely composable and supports a great deal more than people assume it does. bat is nice but to don’t assume stuff can’t be done without it.
Either way, you’d probably rely on either a capable shell’s autocomplete, or shell aliases. Or both.
I’m not trying to dismiss the usefulness of bat, I use it myself. But there’s also a lot of times i don’t have the luxury of installing bat (eg servers, or when working in highly regulated industries where you can only install software from a predefined list of approved packages) and I and others manage just fine.
My point is that the UNIX command line is extremely composable and supports a great deal more than people assume it does. bat is nice but to don’t assume stuff can’t be done without it.