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<p align="center"> <a href="https://pypi.python.org/pypi/howdoi"> <img src="https://www.dropbox.com/s/dk13iy2uoufdwr7/HowDoIcolor512.png?raw=1" alt="Sherlock, your neighborhood command-line sloth sleuth" /> </a> </p> <h1 align="center">howdoi</h1> <h2 align="center">Instant coding answers via the command line</h2> <p align="center"><strong>⚡ Never open your browser to look for help again ⚡</strong></p> <p align="center"> <a href="https://github.com/gleitz/howdoi/actions?query=workflow%3A%22Python+CI%22"><img src="https://img.shields.io/github/actions/workflow/status/gleitz/howdoi/python.yml?style=plastic&color=78dce8" alt="build status"></a> <a href="https://pepy.tech/project/howdoi"><img src="https://img.shields.io/pypi/dm/howdoi?style=plastic&color=ab9df2&maxAge=86400&label=downloads&query=%24.total_downloads&url=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.pepy.tech%2Fapi%2Fprojects%2Fhowdoi" alt="downloads"></a> <a href="https://pypi.python.org/pypi/howdoi"><img src="https://img.shields.io/pypi/pyversions/howdoi.svg?style=plastic&color=ff6188" alt="Python versions"></a> </p>

Introduction to howdoi

Are you a hack programmer? Do you find yourself constantly Googling for how to do basic programming tasks?

Suppose you want to know how to format a date in bash. Why open your browser and read through blogs (risking major distraction) when you can simply stay in the console and ask howdoi:

$ howdoi format date bash
> DATE=`date +%Y-%m-%d`

howdoi will answer all sorts of queries:

$ howdoi print stack trace python
> import traceback
>
> try:
>     1/0
> except:
>     print '>>> traceback <<<'
>     traceback.print_exc()
>     print '>>> end of traceback <<<'
> traceback.print_exc()

$ howdoi convert mp4 to animated gif
> video=/path/to/video.avi
> outdir=/path/to/output.gif
> mplayer "$video" \
>         -ao null \
>         -ss "00:01:00" \  # starting point
>         -endpos 10 \ # duration in second
>         -vo gif89a:fps=13:output=$outdir \
>         -vf scale=240:180

$ howdoi create tar archive
> tar -cf backup.tar --exclude "www/subf3" www

image

Installation

pip install howdoi

or

brew install howdoi

Usage

New to howdoi?

howdoi howdoi

RTFM

Commands

usage: howdoi [-h] [-p POS] [-n NUM] [-a] [-l] [-c] [-x] [-C] [-j] [-v] [-e [ENGINE]]
[--save] [--view] [--remove] [--empty] [QUERY ...]

instant coding answers via the command line

positional arguments:
  QUERY                 the question to answer

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -p POS, --pos POS     select answer in specified position (default: 1)
  -n NUM, --num NUM     number of answers to return (default: 1)
  -a, --all             display the full text of the answer
  -l, --link            display only the answer link
  -c, --color           enable colorized output
  -x, --explain         explain how answer was chosen
  -C, --clear-cache     clear the cache
  -j, --json            return answers in raw json format
  -v, --version         display the current version of howdoi
  -e [ENGINE], --engine [ENGINE]
                        search engine for this query (google, bing, duckduckgo)
  --save, --stash       stash a howdoi answer
  --view                view your stash
  --remove              remove an entry in your stash
  --empty               empty your stash

environment variable examples:
  HOWDOI_COLORIZE=1
  HOWDOI_DISABLE_CACHE=1
  HOWDOI_DISABLE_SSL=1
  HOWDOI_SEARCH_ENGINE=google
  HOWDOI_URL=serverfault.com

Using the howdoi stashing feature (for more advanced features view the keep documentation).

stashing: howdoi --save QUERY
viewing:  howdoi --view
removing: howdoi --remove (will be prompted which answer to delete)
emptying: howdoi --empty (empties entire stash, will be prompted to confirm)

As a shortcut, if you commonly use the same parameters each time and don't want to type them, add something similar to your .bash_profile (or otherwise). This example gives you 5 colored results each time.

alias h='function hdi(){ howdoi $* -c -n 5; }; hdi'

And then to run it from the command line simply type:

$ h format date bash

You can also search other StackExchange properties for answers:

HOWDOI_URL=cooking.stackexchange.com howdoi make pesto

or as an alias:

alias hcook='function hcook(){ HOWDOI_URL=cooking.stackexchange.com howdoi $* ; }; hcook'
hcook make pesto

Other useful aliases:

alias hless='function hdi(){ howdoi $* -c | less --raw-control-chars --quit-if-one-screen --no-init; }; hdi'

Integrations

Contributors

How to contribute

We welcome contributions that make howdoi better and improve the existing functionalities of the project. We have created a separate guide to contributing to howdoi that explains how to get up and running with your first pull request.

Notes