Terminal Table

Install the terminal-table gem using the standard Ruby gem command:

$ gem install terminal-table

To generate a table, require the library and provide an array of arrays to the Terminal::Table.new constructor. Each inner array represents a row in the table.

require 'terminal-table'

rows = []
rows << ['One', 1]
rows << ['Two', 2]
rows << ['Three', 3]
table = Terminal::Table.new :rows => rows

puts table

When setting the :border option in a style, you can pass a symbol. The library converts the symbol into a corresponding Border class. For example, :unicode_round will attempt to instantiate Terminal::Table::UnicodeRoundBorder.

Supported border classes include:

• AsciiBorder (default)
• MarkdownBorder (uses | for all intersections)
• UnicodeBorder (standard Unicode characters)
• UnicodeRoundBorder (rounded corners)
• UnicodeThickEdgeBorder (thick outer edges)

Use the :headings option to define the top row of the table and the :title option to add a centered title above the table.

# Using constructor options
table = Terminal::Table.new :title => "Cheatsheet", :headings => ['Word', 'Number'], :rows => rows

# Or using setter methods
table = Terminal::Table.new
table.title = "Cheatsheet"
table.headings = ['Word', 'Number']
table.rows = rows

You can add rows to a table using the << operator (an alias for add_row) or the add_row method. You can also insert separators between rows using add_separator or by pushing the :separator symbol via <<.

table = Terminal::Table.new do |t|
  t << ['One', 1]          # Using << (push) as an alias for add_row
  t << :separator          # Using << with :separator as an alias for add_separator
  t.add_row ['Two', 2]
  t.add_separator          # Allows setting the separator's border_type
  t.add_row ['Three', 3]
end

Terminal Table supports several border presets via the :border key in the style hash:

• :unicode (standard box art)
• :unicode_round (rounded corners)
• :unicode_thick_edge (thick edges)
• :markdown (Markdown compatible format)
• :ascii (default ASCII borders)

table.style = { :border => :unicode }
table.style = { :border => :unicode_round }
table.style = { :border => :markdown }
table.style = { :border => :ascii }

When adding a separator via add_separator(border_type: :type), you can specify the visual style of the separator. Available border_type values include:

• div, dash, dot3, dot4
• thick, thick_dash, thick_dot3, thick_dot4
• heavy, heavy_dash, heavy_dot3, heavy_dot4
• bold, bold_dash, bold_dot3, bold_dot4
• double

If using style: :all_separators => true, you can manually adjust separator rows by calling table.elaborate_rows and modifying the border_type of the resulting separator objects.

# Manually setting a separator type
add_separator(border_type: :heavy_dash)

# Adjusting implicit separators after elaboration
rows = table.elaborate_rows
rows[2].border_type = :heavy
puts table.render

You can create a new table by instantiating Terminal::Table.new. You can pass an options hash to pre-configure the table, or provide a block to configure it using instance_eval (if the block has no arguments) or by yielding the table instance (if the block has arguments).

Supported keys in the options hash:

• :title: A string for the table title.
• :headings: An array of arrays representing the heading rows.
• :rows: An array of arrays representing the data rows.
• :style: A style object (or hash) for visual configuration.