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Rich#

Rich#

TL;DR

Rich is a python package for making command-line tools look better. Rich contains a drop in replacement of python's default print method which adds additional funcitonality such as pretty-printing lists and dictionaries; colouring and styling text; custom progress bars; and much more.

Installation 

pip install rich
Alternatively if using Pixi: 
pixi add rich --pypi

Usage 

>>> from rich.print import print

>>> print("[blue]Hello World!") # This will make the output blue

Introduction#

From the Rich Documentation:

"Rich is a Python library for writing rich text (with color and style) to the terminal, and for displaying advanced content such as tables, markdown, and syntax highlighted code."

Rich is a python package for printing formatted text to the terminal. It offers a powerful drop-in replacement for python's default print function.

Why Use Rich?#

  • Compatible: Rich has a drop-in replacement for python's print function, so it can be added to any existing python project with just one import statement. Rich will automatically offer syntax highlighting and pretty-printing of lists and dictionaries without any additional user intervention.
  • Powerful: Rich offers text styling, tables, tree printing, live displays, and much more. It's a bare-neccesity for any terminal-based python application.
  • Intuitive: Rich is very easy to use, and their documentation contains examples for every feature they offer. If you're trying to do something with Rich, chances are the documentation already contains a working example you can copy/paste into your project.

Basic Usage#

To use rich, import the replacement print method:

from rich.print import print
print("This is using the rich print method.")

Alternatively, you can create a custom rich console by importing thr Console class:

from rich.console import Console

console = Console()
console.print("This also uses the rich print method.")

Styling text#

Rich offers in-line styling by enclosing your styling tags in square brackets:

from rich.print import print
print("[bold red]This text is bold and red[/bold red] but the rest of this line is normal.")

print("[blue]Since there's no closing tag, this entire line will be blue.")

You may also pass styling tags into the style parameter of the print function: 

from rich.print import print
print("This text is bold and red", style="bold red")

Tables#

Rich offers an easy solution for printing tables of data to the console. Just import the Tables module to get started:

from rich.print import print
from rich.table import Table

Here's an example of a table from the Rich documentation:

from rich.console import Console
from rich.table import Table

table = Table(title="Star Wars Movies")

table.add_column("Released", justify="right", style="cyan", no_wrap=True)
table.add_column("Title", style="magenta")
table.add_column("Box Office", justify="right", style="green")

table.add_row("Dec 20, 2019", "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker", "$952,110,690")
table.add_row("May 25, 2018", "Solo: A Star Wars Story", "$393,151,347")
table.add_row("Dec 15, 2017", "Star Wars Ep. V111: The Last Jedi", "$1,332,539,889")
table.add_row("Dec 16, 2016", "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story", "$1,332,439,889")

console = Console()
console.print(table)

Additional Resources#

Styling Guide: Rich Documentation On Styles Provides information of the available styling options and how to use them. Standard Colours: Rich Documentation On Standard Colours Provides a list of named colors for use in styling terminal output. Tables: Rich Documentation On Tables In-depth guide on creating tables with examples.

Advanced Resources#

Live Displays: Rich Live Displays Page Live displays offer a great way to create persistent and animatied displays in the terminal.

Progess Display: Rich Progress Display Page Rich includes support for custom progress bars and is useful in cases where tqdm doesn't function properly, such as when multiple nested tasks all require progress bars.