Convert SVG images containing barcodes generated by PyQRCode to ASCII art, for displaying in a terminal.
Because I'm a weird person who reads mail using Mutt over SSH in a terminal, and sometimes people send me QR codes for setting up TOTP authentication.
Example:
$ python3
>>> import pyqrcode
>>> qr = pyqrcode.create('Hello world!')
>>> qr.svg('hello.svg')
$ qr2text --white-background hello.svg
█▀▀▀▀▀█ ▀▄█▄▀▄▀▀▄ █▀▀▀▀▀█
█ ███ █ ▀ █▄ █ █ ███ █
█ ▀▀▀ █ ▀▀▄▄▀ ▀ ▄ █ ▀▀▀ █
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ █▄█▄▀▄▀▄▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
▄▄▄▄▀▀ ▄▀▄▀██▀▀▀ ▀▄█▄▀ ▀
▀▀▀▀▀▄▀▀▄▀▄▀▄ ▀▀█▀▄ ▀█ ██
▄█▀▄▀ ▀▀▄ ▄██▄▀ ▀▄ █▄ ▀
█ ▄ ▀▀▀█▄ ██▀█▀██▀█▄▀█
▀ ▀ ▀▀▀▄█▄▀▄█▀▀█▀▀▀███ ▄
█▀▀▀▀▀█ ▄ █▀▄▀██ ▀ █ █
█ ███ █ █▀▄ ▄ ▀▀█▀▀▀█▀▄
█ ▀▀▀ █ ▄▀▀▀▀ ▀ ▄█▄█ █
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▀ ▀ ▀
Hello world!
Note: you may have to tell qr2text whether your terminal is black-on-white (--white-background) or white-on-black (--black-background). Some QR code scanners don't care, but others will refuse to recognize inverted QR codes.
Note: for QR code decoding to work you need to have libzbar installed on your
system (e.g. sudo apt install libzbar0 on Ubuntu).
Synopsis:
usage: qr2text [-h] [--version] [--black-background] [--white-background]
[--big] [--trim] [--pad PAD] [--decode] [--no-decode]
[--encode-text ENCODE_TEXT]
[filename ...]
Convert PyQRCode SVG images to ASCII art
positional arguments:
filename SVG file with the QR code (use - for stdin)
options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--version show program's version number and exit
--black-background terminal is white on black (default)
--white-background, --invert
terminal is black on white
--big use full unicode blocks instead of half blocks
--trim remove empty border
--pad PAD pad with empty border
--decode decode the QR codes (default if libzbar is available)
--no-decode don't decode the QR codes
--encode-text ENCODE_TEXT
generate a QR code with given text