A versatile command-line utility for text and code analysis. Evolved from the classic Unix wc command with enhanced features for modern text processing, including language detection and word frequency analysis.
First, install Go on your system:
# Using Homebrew
brew install go
# Or download from the official website
# https://golang.org/dl/# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install golang
# Fedora
sudo dnf install golang
# Or download from the official website
# https://golang.org/dl/# Using Chocolatey
choco install golang
# Or download the installer from
# https://golang.org/dl/Once Go is installed:
go buildThis will create a lexo executable in the current directory.
To install lexo globally on your system:
go install# Count words from stdin (default)
lexo
# Count words from a file
cat file.txt | lexo
# Count words from a command output
echo "hello world" | lexo
# Count words explicitly
lexo -w
lexo --words
# Count lines instead of words
lexo -l
lexo --lines
# Count characters instead of words
lexo -c
lexo --chars
# Count lines of code in current directory
lexo --loc
# Count lines of code in a specific directory
lexo --loc /path/to/project
# Count lines of code in multiple directories
lexo --loc dir1 dir2 dir3
# Detect language of text (from stdin)
lexo --lang < file.txt
# Detect language with human-readable name (from stdin)
lexo --lang-name < file.txt
# Detect language of specific file
lexo --lang file.txt
# Detect language of multiple files
lexo --lang file1.txt file2.txt
# Detect language with human-readable name
lexo --lang-name file.txt
# Detect language and count words
lexo --lang -w file.txt
# Analyze word frequency (alphabetical order)
lexo --freq file.txt
# Analyze word frequency, sorted by count (most frequent first)
lexo --freq --sort-count file.txt
# Limit frequency results to top N words
lexo --freq --sort-count --limit 5 file.txt
# Analyze multiple files
lexo --freq file1.txt file2.txt# Counting words (default)
echo "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" | lexo
9
# Counting lines
echo -e "line 1\nline 2\nline 3" | lexo -l
3
# Counting characters
echo "hello" | lexo -c
5
# Counting lines of code
lexo --loc .
125
# Detecting language
echo "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" | lexo --lang
Language: en-US
# Detecting language with human-readable name
echo "El zorro marrón rápido salta sobre el perro perezoso" | lexo --lang-name
Language: Spanish (Spain)
# Detecting language and counting words
echo "Le renard brun rapide saute par-dessus le chien paresseux" | lexo --lang -w
Language: fr
Count: 10
# Detecting language of specific files
lexo --lang main.go README.md
main.go:
Language: fr
README.md:
Language: en-US
# Detecting language with human-readable name from file
lexo --lang-name README.md
Language: English (US)
# Word frequency analysis
lexo --freq --sort-count --limit 5 README.md
Word frequency (sorted by count):
----------- ------
the 15
to 12
language 8
of 7
for 6
# Alphabetical word frequency
lexo --freq --limit 5 README.md
Word frequency (sorted alphabetically):
----------- ------
a 5
about 1
accurately 1
add 1
all 3This tool has the following dependencies:
The --lang and --lang-name features use the whatlanggo library for language detection, which supports over 80 languages. This dependency is managed through Go modules and doesn't require separate installation.
- Go 1.16 or newer
# Build the application
go build
# Run all tests
go test ./...
# Run specific test
go test -run TestCountWords
# Check test coverage
go test -cover ./...
# Generate HTML coverage report
go test -coverprofile=coverage.out
go tool cover -html=coverage.out -o coverage.htmlThe project maintains comprehensive test coverage to ensure reliability and stability. Tests cover all major functionality including:
- Word, line, and character counting
- Language detection
- Word frequency analysis
- Command-line flag parsing
- Error handling
This project is open source.