tui-mindmap

Render hierarchical mindmaps as ASCII art in your terminal.

What is this?

tui-mindmap is a CLI tool and Python library that renders mindmaps and hierarchical data as beautiful ASCII art trees using tree connectors (├──, └──, │`).

AI WEALTH DIVIDE

├── The Problem
│   ├── Not rich vs poor anymore
│   └── AI-leveraged vs non-leveraged
│
├── Why Different
│   ├── Tools are cheap ($20/month)
│   └── Value = user ability
│
└── What To Do
    ├── Start now (not tomorrow)
    ├── Daily AI habit
    └── Go deep (not surface)

Why you'll love this

You've got a great idea in your head. You try to explain it to an LLM or your team. And then... it becomes a wall of boring bullets. Structure lost. Impact gone.

What if you could visualize your ideas as clean, scannable trees that actually look good in a terminal? tui-mindmap renders any hierarchical data as beautiful ASCII art that people actually want to read.

AI WEALTH DIVIDE

├── The Problem
│   ├── Not rich vs poor anymore
│   └── AI-leveraged vs non-leveraged
│
└── What To Do
    ├── Start now (not tomorrow)
    ├── Daily AI habit
    └── Go deep (not surface)

No GUI. No dependencies. Just you and your ideas, beautifully structured.

Picture this: You're pair programming with an LLM, and instead of guessing which branch of logic you're in—you see the whole tree. You're explaining a complex system in a terminal-only meeting, and people actually get it. You're debugging a nested data structure and the issue pops out instantly.

That's tui-mindmap. The missing visualization layer for terminal-first workflows.

And it's not just for you—it's for AI agents too. LLMs and agents can use this skill to render their thinking as structured trees, making their reasoning visible and understandable. The skill comes with built-in instructions that guide the LLM on how to:

• Decide the right depth for each branch (2-4 levels optimal)
• Balance breadth vs depth for readability
• Dynamically structure the tree based on the information being visualized
• Avoid going too deep unless the topic genuinely requires it

Why it's great

• Unlimited depth — Go as deep as your thinking requires
• Zero dependencies — Pure Python, runs anywhere
• LLM-optimized — Built for AI agents to generate trees dynamically
• 2-4 levels optimal — Balanced for readability, with room to go deeper when needed

Get started

npx skills add webboty/tui-mindmap
python3 scripts/render_mindmap.py --demo

Or drop it into your code:

from render_mindmap import Mindmap, Node

mm = Mindmap("My Project")
mm.add("Phase 1", "Research", "Planning")
mm.add_node(Node("Phase 2", [Node("Build", [Node("Frontend"), Node("Backend")])]))
mm.print()

Once you see your ideas as trees, you'll never go back to bullets.

Installation

Via npx (recommended)

npx skills add webboty/tui-mindmap

Manual

git clone https://github.com/webboty/tui-mindmap.git
cd tui-mindmap
python3 scripts/render_mindmap.py --demo

Python API

from render_mindmap import Mindmap, Node

# Basic 2-level
mm = Mindmap("Title").add("Node", "Child1", "Child2")

# Deep nesting with Node
mm.add_node(Node("Root", [Node("Level 2", [Node("Level 3")])]))

mm.print()

Features

• Unlimited depth (2-4 levels optimal, more possible)
• Terminal-optimized output
• Clean tree connectors
• Python-first design
• Great for LLM interaction

License

MIT