shue highlights terminal output with configurable rules. It wraps your normal SSH client by default, runs other programs, or filters stdin. Existing terminal colors and non-UTF-8 bytes are preserved.

shue username@host

Inspired by ChromaTerm2, with compatible YAML configuration and PCRE2 regex support.

Supports macOS and Linux on Apple Silicon/ARM64 and x86-64.

brew install thatmattlove/tap/shue

Download an archive and SHA256SUMS from Releases:

Verify and install the downloaded archive (example: ARM64 macOS, v0.1.0):

set -eu
VERSION=0.1.0
TARGET=aarch64-apple-darwin
ARCHIVE="shue-v${VERSION}-${TARGET}.tar.gz"
grep "  ${ARCHIVE}$" SHA256SUMS | shasum -a 256 -c -
tar -xzf "$ARCHIVE"
install -d "$HOME/.local/bin"
install -m 0755 "${ARCHIVE%.tar.gz}/shue" "$HOME/.local/bin/shue"

Add $HOME/.local/bin to PATH, then run shue --version. For source builds, see CONTRIBUTING.md.

Use your usual SSH arguments, with shue options first:

shue username@host
shue --color-depth truecolor -p 2222 username@host
shue -J bastion.example.net username@host show interfaces

The first positional or unrecognized argument ends shue option parsing; all remaining arguments pass through unchanged. Use -- to end parsing explicitly. SSH configuration, agents, host aliases, and exit codes work as usual.

Shue selects the SSH client from --ssh-path PATH, then SHUE_SSH, then ssh on PATH.

Use --exec to wrap a program, or --filter to highlight stdin:

shue --exec ping -c 4 192.0.2.1
shue --config ./rules.yaml --exec tail -f /var/log/system.log
journalctl -b | shue --filter | less -R
shue --filter < session.log

All arguments after the --exec program pass through unchanged. Filter mode keeps highlighting enabled when stdout is piped. Run shue --help for all options.

The embedded defaults highlight status words, IP addresses, URLs, and numbers. To customize them, save a config at $HOME/.config/shue/config.yaml or select one with --config PATH.

Configuration sources are checked in order; the first available source wins:

1. --config PATH
2. SHUE_CONFIG
3. $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/shue/config.yaml (defaults to $HOME/.config/shue/config.yaml)
4. shue/config.yaml in each absolute XDG_CONFIG_DIRS entry (default: /etc/xdg)
5. /etc/shue/config.yaml
6. embedded defaults

Each discovered directory also checks config.yml after config.yaml. Explicit paths must exist; unreadable files and invalid UTF-8 are errors. Invalid YAML produces a warning and an empty configuration. Invalid palette entries, rules, or color groups are skipped with a shue: warning: diagnostic; valid rules remain active.

Use top-level palette and rules, with description, regex, color, and exclusive fields per rule:

palette:
  accent: "#5f87ff"

rules:
  - description: request result
    regex: "status=(?<status>ok|failed)"
    color:
      status: "f.accent bold"
    exclusive: true

color accepts a style string or a map of capture groups to styles. Group 0 styles the whole match. Exclusive rules take priority over later overlapping rules. See examples/config.yaml for more examples.

PCRE2 byte regexes support lookahead, lookbehind, numeric and named captures, and backreferences. Use single-quoted YAML strings for patterns with backslashes. Available features and lookbehind limits depend on the linked PCRE2 version. If a rule hits a runtime limit, shue disables it, warns once, and continues with the remaining rules.

ANSI colors follow your terminal theme:

color: "fg:red bg:default bold"

Names: black, red, green, yellow, blue, magenta (or purple), cyan, white, their bright-* variants, and default.

Custom colors accept f#rrggbb, b#rrggbb, f.name, b.name, fg:#rrggbb, bg:#rrggbb, fg:rgb(r,g,b), and bg:rgb(r,g,b). Styles include bold, dim, italic, underline, blink, invert, hidden, and strike.

Set --color-depth or SHUE_COLOR_DEPTH to auto (default), ansi16, ansi256, or truecolor. Auto detection uses COLORTERM and TERM, falling back to ansi16. RGB colors are converted for lower color depths. Use --no-color or NO_COLOR to disable added highlighting.

• Windows/ConPTY is not supported.
• Interactive programs use a PTY, combining stdout and stderr. With redirected input or output, only stdout is highlighted; stderr passes through unchanged.
• Prompt flushing creates a boundary that regexes cannot match across.
• Support for styles such as blink, italic, hidden, and strike varies by terminal.

See CONTRIBUTING.md for development, verification, and releases.