A line editor interface wrapper for Rob Pike's Ivy, an interpreter for an APL-like language. It provides a Readline-style input prompt with input history and tab-completion.
The original ivy command interacts with the world via standard input/output,
integrating well with a Unix or
Plan 9 environment or a text editor like
Acme.
However, if you prefer or are used to a mode of interaction more akin to Bash,
Haskell's GHCi, or Python's REPL with an interactive line editor, then this
project is for you.
Although Ivy is described by its creator as "a plaything," it should not
be underestimated.
Watch Russ Cox' videos
of solutions for Advent of Code 2021
using Ivy for a demonstration of its capabilities or take the built-in
tour with the )demo command.
First install Ivy itself, if you haven't already done so:
go install robpike.io/ivy@latest # or @master if you want to use
# the development version of Ivy.
The ivy binary needs to be in the PATH for ivy-prompt to locate it.
Then install this wrapper:
go install github.com/fzipp/ivy-prompt@latest
Run it:
ivy-prompt
See the liner documentation for
a complete table of supported keystrokes / actions. Here's a small selection:
| Keystroke | Action |
|---|---|
| Tab | Next completion |
| Up | Previous match from history |
| Down | Next match from history |
| Ctrl-L | Clear screen (line is unmodified) |
| Ctrl-D | (if line is empty) quit |
Tab-completion works not only with built-in identifiers but also with user-defined variables and operators.
It is context-aware to some extent.
For example, it will provide different completion options
after )help , )get ", )save ", or sys "
compared to the usual context.
The input history is preserved across sessions
in a file named ivy_history
within the ivy subdirectory,
located within the user configuration directory.
The specific location of this directory
depends on the operating system:
| Operating system | Config directory |
|---|---|
| Linux/Unix | $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/ivy/ |
| macOS | $HOME/Library/Application Support/ivy/ |
| Windows | %AppData%\ivy\ |
This project is free and open source software licensed under the BSD 3-Clause License.