| < podlators | Russ Allbery > Software | Tie::ShadowHash > |
Ah, September, when the sysadmins turn colors and fall off the trees....
Dave van Domelen
This Perl module is a simple and convenient interface to the ANSI terminal escape sequences for color (from ECMA-48, also included in ISO 6429). The color sequences are provided in two forms, either as constants for each color or via a function that takes the names of colors and returns the appropriate escape codes or wraps them around the provided text. The non-color text style codes from ANSI X3.64 (bold, dark, underline, and reverse), which were also included in ECMA-48 and ISO 6429, are also supported.
This module is very stable, and I've used it in a wide variety of applications. It has been included in the core Perl distribution starting with version 5.6.0, so you don't need to download and install it yourself unless you have an old version of Perl or need a newer version of the module than comes with your version of Perl. I continue to maintain it as a separate module, and the version included in Perl is resynced with mine before each release.
The original module came out of a discussion in comp.lang.perl.misc and is a combination of two approaches, one with constants by Zenin and one with functions that I wrote. I offered to maintain a combined module that included both approaches.
All this module requires to run is Perl 5.001 or later. However, in order to actually see color, you will need to use a terminal window that supports the ANSI escape sequences for color. Any recent version of xterm, most xterm derivatives and replacements, and most telnet and ssh clients for Windows and Macintosh should work, as will the MacOS X Terminal application. The console windows for Windows NT and Windows 2000 will not work, as they do not even attempt to support ANSI X3.64.
For a complete (to my current knowledge) compatibility list, see the documentation. If you have any additions to the table in the documentation, please send them to me.
Copyright 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2005, 2006 by Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu> and Zenin.
This program is free software; you may redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. This means that you may choose between the two licenses that Perl is released under: the GNU GPL and the Artistic License. Please see your Perl distribution for the details and copies of the licenses.
The module:
| Term::ANSIColor 1.12 | 2007-04-23 | Download: HTTP, FTP |
Documentation:
| < podlators | Russ Allbery > Software | Tie::ShadowHash > |