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A list of command-line tools for manipulating structured text data

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Structured text tools

The following is a list of text-based file formats and command-line tools for manipulating each.

Contents

awk-like

Tools that work with lines of fields separated by delimiters but do not necessarily support CSV field quoting.

awk

AWK/awk is a programming language and a POSIX-standard command-line tool. (You will sometimes see "awk" used for the tool and "AWK" for the language. This document follows this convention. GNU Awk uses "Awk".) If you run Linux, macOS, or a BSD, you almost certainly have it installed. See below for Windows.

  • If you already know how to program, the nawk man page is a great way to learn AWK quickly. What you learn from it will apply to other implementations on different platforms. Read it first if you feel overwhelmed by the sheer size of the GNU Awk manual.
  • awk.info archive an extensive resource on Awk.
  • "AWK Vs NAWK Vs GAWK" a comparison of features present in different implementations.
  • busybox-w32 includes a full implementation of POSIX awk and other tools like sed in a single Windows executable.
  • frawk is a Rust implementation of a language partially compatible with AWK that supports parallelism and CSV input and output.
  • GNU Awk 5 binaries for Windows by EZWinPorts.
  • GoAWK is a cross-platform implementation of awk with added support for CSV. The project provides binaries for many platforms, including Windows.

POSIX commands

  • comm Select the lines common to two sorted files or the lines contained in only one of them. (Manual: man 1 comm on your system, GNU, FreeBSD.)
  • cut Select portions of each line in one or more files. (Manual: man 1 cut, GNU, FreeBSD.)
  • grep Select the lines that match or do not match a pattern from one or more files. (Manual: man 1 grep, GNU, FreeBSD.)
  • join Take two files sorted by a common field and join their lines on the value of that field. Lines with values that do not appear in the other file are discarded. (Manual: man 1 join, GNU, FreeBSD.)
  • paste Combine several consecutive lines in a text file into one. (Manual: man 1 paste, GNU, FreeBSD.)
  • sort Sort lines by key fields. (Manual: man 1 sort, GNU, FreeBSD.)
  • uniq Find or remove repeated lines. (Manual: man 1 uniq, GNU, FreeBSD.)

Other tools

  • csvquote Transform CSV to and from a format processable with awk-like tools.
  • GNU datamash Perform statistical operations on text input.
  • Hawk Transform text from the command-line using Haskell expressions.
  • pyp Transform input (as text lines or as a whole) using Python code with automatic module imports. Can generate a Python script equivalent to its invocation. In Python 3.11 or later supports TOML through tomllib.
  • rq Convert between Apache Avro, CBOR, CSV, JSON, MessagePack, Protocol Buffers, TOML, YAML, and awk-style plain text.
  • vnlog Process labelled tabular ASCII data using normal UNIX tools. Can plot data with gnuplot.

CSV

CSV, TSV, and other delimiter-separated value formats. Tools belong on this list if they support field quoting.

  • csv-nix-tools List *nix system information such as environment variables, files, processes, network connections, users as CSV. Manipulate and pretty-print CSV. Execute CSV rows as commands.
  • csv2html Convert CSV to HTML tables.
  • csv2md Convert CSV to Markdown tables.
  • csvfaker Generate CSV files with fake data. Supports different types of fake data in different locales: names, cities, jobs, email addresses, and others.
  • csvfix A multitool. Compare, filter, normalize, split, and validate CSV files. Reorder, remove, split, and merge fields. Convert data between fixed-width, multi-line, XML, and DSV format. Generate SQL statements. (Unofficial mirror.)
  • csvkit csvkit is a suite of command-line tools for converting to and working with CSV: convert, clean, cut, grep, join, sort, stack, format, render, query, analyze, etc.
  • csvquote Transform CSV to and from a format processable with awk-like tools.
  • csvtk Search, sample, cut, join, transpose, and sort CSV/TSV files. Rename columns. Replace fields and generate new fiends from existing fields. Plot data as vector or raster histograms and box, line, and scatter plots. Convert CSV to Markdown. Convert XLSX to CSV. Split XLSX sheets.
  • CSVtoTable Convert CSV to a searchable and sortable HTML table.
  • dasel Query and update data structures from the command line. Comparable to jq/yq but supports CSV, JSON, TOML, YAML, and XML. Static binaries available for releases.
  • eBay's TSV utilities Filtering, statistics, sampling, joins and other operations on TSV files. High performance, especially good for large datasets. Written in D.
  • emuto CLI tool similar to jq. Create and manipulate CSV, TSV, and JSON. Can be compiled to JavaScript.
  • frawk A Rust implementation of a language partially compatible with AWK that supports parallelism and CSV input and output. frawk is an awk-derived language with a CSV mode for input and for output.
  • GoAWK A cross-platform implementation of awk with added support for CSV. The project provides binaries for many platforms, including Windows. GoAWK is an awk implementation that adds a CSV mode for input and for output.
  • Graphtage Compare and merge tree-like structures semantically. Supports JSON, JSON5, XML, HTML, YAML, and CSV. Can be used as a Python library.
  • jp (sgreben) Plot JSON and CSV data in the terminal. Supports different kinds of plots: bar charts, line charts, scatter plots, histograms, and heatmaps.
  • Mario Manipulate and convert between CSV, JSON, YAML, TOML, and XML with Python code.
  • MCMD (M-Command) Select, sample, cut, join, sort, reformat, and generate CSV files. Contains a large set of commands.
  • Miller sed, awk, cut, join and sort for name-indexed data such as CSV and tabular JSON.
  • Nushell A command shell. Can natively load data from CSV, INI, JSON, TOML, TSV, XML, YAML, and other formats.
  • pawk Process text with AWK-like patterns, but Python code.
  • qsv Index, slice, analyze, split, and join CSV files. A fork of xsv that adds subcommands and features.
  • ReadStat Convert statistics package datasets between SAS (SAS7BDAT, XPORT), SPSS (POR, SAV, ZSAV), and Stata (DTA). Convert those formats to CSV and XLSX. Can be used as a C library with bindings for Julia, Python, and R.
  • rows A Python library with a CLI. Convert between a number of file formats for tabular data: CSV, XLS, XLSX, ODS, and others. Query the data (via SQLite). Combine tables. Generate schemas.
  • rq Convert between Apache Avro, CBOR, CSV, JSON, MessagePack, Protocol Buffers, TOML, YAML, and awk-style plain text.
  • scrubcsv Remove bad lines from a CSV file and normalize the rest. Written in Rust.
  • Skeem Infer SQL DDL statements from tabular data. Supports CSV, JSON, JSON Lines, ODS, XLSX, and other formats.
  • tab A non-Turing-complete statically typed programming language for data processing. An alternative to awk.
  • teip Select fields, character ranges, or regular expression matches from standard input. Replace them with the output of a command.
  • tv View delimited files in the terminal.
  • xsv Index, slice, analyze, split, and join CSV files.
  • zsv Slice, combine, reformat, flatten/unflatten CSV (TSV, DSV) files. Query them with SQL and jq filters. Convert between them, JSON, and SQLite 3. Also a C library.

SQL-based tools

See the big comparison list. It covers

  • AlaSQL CLI
  • csvq
  • csvsql
  • fsql
  • Musoq
  • q
  • RBQL
  • rows
  • Sqawk (dbohdan)
  • sqawk (tjunier)
  • Squawk
  • termsql
  • trdsql
  • textql

HTML

  • Graphtage Compare and merge tree-like structures semantically. Supports JSON, JSON5, XML, HTML, YAML, and CSV. Can be used as a Python library.
  • hred Query XML and HTML with a query language based on CSS selectors.
  • html-xml-utils A number of simple utilities (like hxcopy, hxpipe, hxunent, hxselect) for manipulating HTML and XML files from W3C. Written in C, quite old-fashioned, but still relevant and maintained.
  • htmlq Query HTML with CSS selectors. Can remove elements in the output.
  • pup Query HTML pages with CSS selectors. Static binaries available for releases. Inspired by jq.
  • Saxon Query XML and HTML data with XPath. Documentation.
  • Temme Query HTML with CSS-like selectors to extract JSON. Temme extends CSS selectors with value capture patterns.
  • tidy-html5 Validate, fix, and reformat HTML(5), XHTML, and XML documents. Convert HTML to XHTML.
  • tq Query HTML with CSS selectors.
  • Xidel Query or modify XML and HTML pages with XPath, XQuery 3, and CSS selectors.
  • xml2 Convert XML and HTML to and from flat, greppable lists of "path=value" statements. Source code mirror.
  • xpe Query HTML and XML with XPath expressions.

JSON

  • Cels Patch JSON, TOML, and YAML with patches in the same format with some special values. Can be used as a Python library.
  • clconf Merge multiple config files and extract values from them using path string. Supports JSON and YAML. Can be used as a Go library.
  • dasel Query and update data structures from the command line. Comparable to jq/yq but supports CSV, JSON, TOML, YAML, and XML. Static binaries available for releases.
  • emuto CLI tool similar to jq. Create and manipulate CSV, TSV, and JSON. Can be compiled to JavaScript.
  • fastgron Convert JSON to and from GRON, a flat, greppable list of path=value statements. Much faster than the original gron on large files.
  • ffs Mount JSON, TOML, and YAML as a Unix filesystem.
  • fx Run arbitrary JavaScript on JSON input. Standalone binaries available.
  • gojq A pure Go implementation of jq. Supports YAML input and output.
  • Graphtage Compare and merge tree-like structures semantically. Supports JSON, JSON5, XML, HTML, YAML, and CSV. Can be used as a Python library.
  • gron Convert JSON to and from GRON, a flat, greppable list of path=value statements.
  • jaq A Rust implementation of jq with minor changes to the language to make it more predictable.
  • JC Convert the output of standard command-line tools to JSON.
  • jello Query JSON and JSON Lines with Python code. Output the result in a line-based format suitable for creating Bash arrays. Generate a grep-able schema.
  • jet Convert between JSON, YAML, Clojure's edn, and Transit. Transform them with Clojure code.
  • jfq Query and transform JSON with the JSONata language.
  • jj Query and modify values in JSON or JSON Lines with a key path.
  • jl Query and manipulate JSON using a tiny functional language.
  • jo Create JSON objects from the shell.
  • jp (jmespath) Query JSON with JMESPath.
  • jp (sgreben) Plot JSON and CSV data in the terminal. Supports different kinds of plots: bar charts, line charts, scatter plots, histograms, and heatmaps.
  • jplot Plot real-time JSON data in the terminal (works with terminals supporting graphic rendering).
  • jq Create and manipulate JSON with a functional (as in "functional programming") DSL. Can convert JSON to other formats.
  • jql Create and manipulate JSON with a Lisp-syntax DSL.
  • jshon Create and manipulate JSON using getopt-style command-line options.
  • json Run arbitrary JavaScript on JSON input.
  • json-patch Apply RFC 6902 JSON Patches to JSON. The CLI tool is secondary to a Go library that also creates and applies RFC 7386 JSON merge patches.
  • json-table Convert nested JSON into CSV or TSV for processing in the shell.
  • json.tool Validate and pretty-print JSON. This module is part of the standard library of Python 2/3 and is likely to be available wherever Python is installed. (Python 3 docs.)
  • json2 Convert JSON to and from flat, greppable lists of "path=value" statements. Modeled after xml2.
  • jsonaxe Create and manipulate JSON with a Python-based DSL. Inspired by jq.
  • jsonwatch Track changes in JSON data from the command line. Works like watch -d.
  • jtbl Format JSON or JSON Lines as a plain-text table.
  • jtc Create, manipulate, search, validate JSON with path expressions. Can be used as a C++14 library.
  • lobar Process JSON and explore it interactively with a wrapper for lodash.chain(). An alternative to jq with JavaScript syntax.
  • madato Convert ODS and XLSX spreadsheets to JSON, Markdown, and YAML.
  • Mario Manipulate and convert between CSV, JSON, YAML, TOML, and XML with Python code.
  • Nushell A command shell. Can natively load data from CSV, INI, JSON, TOML, TSV, XML, YAML, and other formats.
  • pyp Transform input (as text lines or as a whole) using Python code with automatic module imports. Can generate a Python script equivalent to its invocation. In Python 3.11 or later supports TOML through tomllib.
  • qpyson Query and manipulate JSON with Python.
  • query-json A faster jq implementation written in Reason Native (OCaml).
  • quicktype Infer the underlying model of the JSON and output as types for various programming languages or JSON Schema. CLI and Web UI.
  • ramda-cli Manipulate JSON with the Ramda functional library, and either LiveScript or JavaScript syntax.
  • RecordStream Create, manipulate, and output a stream of records, or JSON objects. Can retrieve records from an SQL database, MongoDB, Atom feeds, XML, and other sources.
  • Remarshal Convert between CBOR, JSON, MessagePack, TOML, and YAML. Validate each of the formats. Pretty-print JSON, TOML, and YAML.
  • rq Convert between Apache Avro, CBOR, CSV, JSON, MessagePack, Protocol Buffers, TOML, YAML, and awk-style plain text.
  • Skeem Infer SQL DDL statements from tabular data. Supports CSV, JSON, JSON Lines, ODS, XLSX, and other formats.
  • validjson Validate or pretty-print JSON.
  • xml-to-json-fast Convert XML to JSON. Can handle very large XML files.
  • xmljson Convert multiple and large XML files to JSON. Written in Swift.
  • yaml-diff-patch Patch YAML with RFC 6902 JSON Patches. Generate a JSON Patch from two JSON documents or a YAML and a JSON document. Preserves style. Can be used as a TypeScript library.
  • yamlpath Query, modify, diff, merge, and validate YAML and JSON with YAML Paths. Also a Python library.

TOML

With a format converter like Remarshal you can use JSON tools to process TOML and YAML, but make sure you do not lose data in the conversion.

  • Cels Patch JSON, TOML, and YAML with patches in the same format with some special values. Can be used as a Python library.
  • dasel Query and update data structures from the command line. Comparable to jq/yq but supports CSV, JSON, TOML, YAML, and XML. Static binaries available for releases.
  • ffs Mount JSON, TOML, and YAML as a Unix filesystem.
  • Mario Manipulate and convert between CSV, JSON, YAML, TOML, and XML with Python code.
  • Nushell A command shell. Can natively load data from CSV, INI, JSON, TOML, TSV, XML, YAML, and other formats.
  • pyp Transform input (as text lines or as a whole) using Python code with automatic module imports. Can generate a Python script equivalent to its invocation. In Python 3.11 or later supports TOML through tomllib.
  • Remarshal Convert between CBOR, JSON, MessagePack, TOML, and YAML. Validate each of the formats. Pretty-print JSON, TOML, and YAML.
  • rq Convert between Apache Avro, CBOR, CSV, JSON, MessagePack, Protocol Buffers, TOML, YAML, and awk-style plain text.
  • taplo-cli Query, format, and validate (lint) TOML.
  • validtoml Validate TOML.
  • yq (kislyuk) jq wrapper for YAML, XML, and TOML.

XML

  • csvfix A multitool. Compare, filter, normalize, split, and validate CSV files. Reorder, remove, split, and merge fields. Convert data between fixed-width, multi-line, XML, and DSV format. Generate SQL statements. (Unofficial mirror.)
  • dasel Query and update data structures from the command line. Comparable to jq/yq but supports CSV, JSON, TOML, YAML, and XML. Static binaries available for releases.
  • Graphtage Compare and merge tree-like structures semantically. Supports JSON, JSON5, XML, HTML, YAML, and CSV. Can be used as a Python library.
  • hred Query XML and HTML with a query language based on CSS selectors.
  • html-xml-utils A number of simple utilities (like hxcopy, hxpipe, hxunent, hxselect) for manipulating HTML and XML files from W3C. Written in C, quite old-fashioned, but still relevant and maintained.
  • Mario Manipulate and convert between CSV, JSON, YAML, TOML, and XML with Python code.
  • Nushell A command shell. Can natively load data from CSV, INI, JSON, TOML, TSV, XML, YAML, and other formats.
  • Saxon Query XML and HTML data with XPath. Documentation.
  • sml2 Convert between XML and SML, a simplified XML representation.
  • tidy-html5 Validate, fix, and reformat HTML(5), XHTML, and XML documents. Convert HTML to XHTML.
  • Xidel Query or modify XML and HTML pages with XPath, XQuery 3, and CSS selectors.
  • xml-to-json-fast Convert XML to JSON. Can handle very large XML files.
  • xml2 Convert XML and HTML to and from flat, greppable lists of "path=value" statements. Source code mirror.
  • xmljson Convert multiple and large XML files to JSON. Written in Swift.
  • XMLLint Query (including XSLT), validate and reformat XML documents.
  • XMLStarlet Query, modify, and validate XML documents.
  • xpe Query HTML and XML with XPath expressions.
  • xq jq wrapper for XML documents.
  • xsltproc Transform XML documents using XSLT and EXSLT.
  • yq (kislyuk) jq wrapper for YAML, XML, and TOML.

See also

YAML

  • Cels Patch JSON, TOML, and YAML with patches in the same format with some special values. Can be used as a Python library.
  • clconf Merge multiple config files and extract values from them using path string. Supports JSON and YAML. Can be used as a Go library.
  • dasel Query and update data structures from the command line. Comparable to jq/yq but supports CSV, JSON, TOML, YAML, and XML. Static binaries available for releases.
  • dy Construct YAML from a directory tree.
  • ffs Mount JSON, TOML, and YAML as a Unix filesystem.
  • gojq A pure Go implementation of jq. Supports YAML input and output.
  • Graphtage Compare and merge tree-like structures semantically. Supports JSON, JSON5, XML, HTML, YAML, and CSV. Can be used as a Python library.
  • jet Convert between JSON, YAML, Clojure's edn, and Transit. Transform them with Clojure code.
  • madato Convert ODS and XLSX spreadsheets to JSON, Markdown, and YAML.
  • Mario Manipulate and convert between CSV, JSON, YAML, TOML, and XML with Python code.
  • Nushell A command shell. Can natively load data from CSV, INI, JSON, TOML, TSV, XML, YAML, and other formats.
  • Remarshal Convert between CBOR, JSON, MessagePack, TOML, and YAML. Validate each of the formats. Pretty-print JSON, TOML, and YAML.
  • rq Convert between Apache Avro, CBOR, CSV, JSON, MessagePack, Protocol Buffers, TOML, YAML, and awk-style plain text.
  • shyaml Query YAML. Can output null-terminated strings for use in shell scripts.
  • validyaml Validate or pretty-print YAML.
  • yaml-diff-patch Patch YAML with RFC 6902 JSON Patches. Generate a JSON Patch from two JSON documents or a YAML and a JSON document. Preserves style. Can be used as a TypeScript library.
  • yaml-tools A set of CLI tools to manipulate YAML files (merge, delete, etc...) with comment preservation, based on ruamel.yaml.
  • yamlpath Query, modify, diff, merge, and validate YAML and JSON with YAML Paths. Also a Python library.
  • yq (kislyuk) jq wrapper for YAML, XML, and TOML.
  • yq (mikefarah) Query, modify, and merge YAML. Convert to and from JSON.

Configuration files

/etc/hosts

  • hostctl Add and remove entries in /etc/hosts. Disable (comment out) and enable (uncomment) entries. Idempotent. Preserves arbitrary comments above its section of the hosts file. Works with groups of entries called "profiles".
  • hostess Add and remove entries in /etc/hosts. Disable (comment out) and enable (uncomment) entries. Check if a hostname exists. Reformat the hosts file. Convert the entries to JSON. Idempotent. Removes arbitrary comments.
  • hosts Add and remove entries in /etc/hosts. Change a hostname's IP address. Idempotent. Preserves arbitrary comments. Can be used as a Tcl library.

INI

  • cfget
    • Platform: Any with Python 2.6-2.7?
    • License: GPL-2.0-or-later
    • Description: Retrieve properties as shell script commands to set the corresponding variables (with --dump exports). Retrieve properties' values as plain text. Substitute values from an INI file in an Autoconf-style template. Supports plug-ins. Chokes on section names and keys with spaces.
  • confget
    • Platform: Free/Net/OpenBSD, Linux, likely others
    • License: BSD-2-Clause
    • Description: Retrieve properties and sections as shell script commands to set the corresponding variables. Retrieve properties' values as plain text. Check for existence of properties. List sections. Find values that match a pattern. Read-only. Has a C, Python, and Rust implementation. The Rust implementation can be installed with cargo install confget.
  • crudini
    • Platform: Any with Python 2.6–2.7 or 3.x
    • License: GPL-2.0
    • Description: Retrieve properties and sections as INI fragments or shell script commands to set the corresponding variables. Retrieve properties' values as plain text. Set properties. Remove properties and sections. Create empty sections. Merge INI files. Changes files in place.
  • inicomp
    • Platform: Windows, POSIX
    • License: Apache-2.0
    • Description: Compare INI (and also Windows .reg) files.
  • IniFile
    • Platform: Windows (x86, x86-64), MS-DOS
    • License: Closed-source freeware
    • Description: Retrieve properties and sections as batch file commands to set the corresponding variables. Set properties. Remove properties and sections. Changes files in place.
  • initool
    • Platform: FreeBSD, Linux, Windows
    • License: MIT
    • Description: Retrieve properties and sections as INI fragments. Retrieve properties' values as plain text. Set properties. Check for existence of properties and sections. Remove properties and sections. Outputs the updated INI file.
  • Nushell (from ini)
    • Platform: Free/Net/OpenBSD, Linux, macOS, Windows
    • License: MIT
    • Description: Query and transform data with the Nushell language.

Multiple formats

  • Augeas Query and modify a number of file formats. Not all of the formats are equally well supported by Augeas and for some only a limited subset of all valid files can be parsed.
  • Elektra Query and modify configuration files. Shares Augeas' limitations when it comes to application-specific configuration files (it uses the same lenses), but has better support for generic formats such as JSON and INI.

Log files

  • lnav Query and watch log files. Has batch and interactive mode. Supported formats include the Common Log Format, CUPS page_log, syslog, strace, and generic timestamped messages. Can perform SQL queries.
  • Squawk Query Apache and Nginx log files. See the SQL-based tool comparison.

Multiformat tools

Tools that support multiple input formats. Programs that convert between only two formats in both directions are excluded. We only count JSON support that is separate from YAML.

  • Augeas Query and modify a number of file formats. Not all of the formats are equally well supported by Augeas and for some only a limited subset of all valid files can be parsed.
  • Cels Patch JSON, TOML, and YAML with patches in the same format with some special values. Can be used as a Python library.
  • clconf Merge multiple config files and extract values from them using path string. Supports JSON and YAML. Can be used as a Go library.
  • csvfix A multitool. Compare, filter, normalize, split, and validate CSV files. Reorder, remove, split, and merge fields. Convert data between fixed-width, multi-line, XML, and DSV format. Generate SQL statements. (Unofficial mirror.)
  • csvtk Search, sample, cut, join, transpose, and sort CSV/TSV files. Rename columns. Replace fields and generate new fiends from existing fields. Plot data as vector or raster histograms and box, line, and scatter plots. Convert CSV to Markdown. Convert XLSX to CSV. Split XLSX sheets.
  • dasel Query and update data structures from the command line. Comparable to jq/yq but supports CSV, JSON, TOML, YAML, and XML. Static binaries available for releases.
  • Elektra Query and modify configuration files. Shares Augeas' limitations when it comes to application-specific configuration files (it uses the same lenses), but has better support for generic formats such as JSON and INI.
  • emuto CLI tool similar to jq. Create and manipulate CSV, TSV, and JSON. Can be compiled to JavaScript.
  • ffs Mount JSON, TOML, and YAML as a Unix filesystem.
  • frawk A Rust implementation of a language partially compatible with AWK that supports parallelism and CSV input and output. frawk is an awk-derived language with a CSV mode for input and for output.
  • GoAWK A cross-platform implementation of awk with added support for CSV. The project provides binaries for many platforms, including Windows. GoAWK is an awk implementation that adds a CSV mode for input and for output.
  • gojq A pure Go implementation of jq. Supports YAML input and output.
  • Graphtage Compare and merge tree-like structures semantically. Supports JSON, JSON5, XML, HTML, YAML, and CSV. Can be used as a Python library.
  • hred Query XML and HTML with a query language based on CSS selectors.
  • html-xml-utils A number of simple utilities (like hxcopy, hxpipe, hxunent, hxselect) for manipulating HTML and XML files from W3C. Written in C, quite old-fashioned, but still relevant and maintained.
  • jet Convert between JSON, YAML, Clojure's edn, and Transit. Transform them with Clojure code.
  • jp (sgreben) Plot JSON and CSV data in the terminal. Supports different kinds of plots: bar charts, line charts, scatter plots, histograms, and heatmaps.
  • lnav Query and watch log files. Has batch and interactive mode. Supported formats include the Common Log Format, CUPS page_log, syslog, strace, and generic timestamped messages. Can perform SQL queries.
  • madato Convert ODS and XLSX spreadsheets to JSON, Markdown, and YAML.
  • Mario Manipulate and convert between CSV, JSON, YAML, TOML, and XML with Python code.
  • Nushell A command shell. Can natively load data from CSV, INI, JSON, TOML, TSV, XML, YAML, and other formats.
  • pyp Transform input (as text lines or as a whole) using Python code with automatic module imports. Can generate a Python script equivalent to its invocation. In Python 3.11 or later supports TOML through tomllib.
  • RecordStream Create, manipulate, and output a stream of records, or JSON objects. Can retrieve records from an SQL database, MongoDB, Atom feeds, XML, and other sources.
  • ReadStat Convert statistics package datasets between SAS (SAS7BDAT, XPORT), SPSS (POR, SAV, ZSAV), and Stata (DTA). Convert those formats to CSV and XLSX. Can be used as a C library with bindings for Julia, Python, and R.
  • Remarshal Convert between CBOR, JSON, MessagePack, TOML, and YAML. Validate each of the formats. Pretty-print JSON, TOML, and YAML.
  • rows A Python library with a CLI. Convert between a number of file formats for tabular data: CSV, XLS, XLSX, ODS, and others. Query the data (via SQLite). Combine tables. Generate schemas.
  • rq Convert between Apache Avro, CBOR, CSV, JSON, MessagePack, Protocol Buffers, TOML, YAML, and awk-style plain text.
  • Saxon Query XML and HTML data with XPath. Documentation.
  • Skeem Infer SQL DDL statements from tabular data. Supports CSV, JSON, JSON Lines, ODS, XLSX, and other formats.
  • tidy-html5 Validate, fix, and reformat HTML(5), XHTML, and XML documents. Convert HTML to XHTML.
  • VisiData Explore interactively data in TSV, CSV, XLS, XLSX, HDF5, JSON, and other formats. Introduction.
  • Xidel Query or modify XML and HTML pages with XPath, XQuery 3, and CSS selectors.
  • xml2 Convert XML and HTML to and from flat, greppable lists of "path=value" statements. Source code mirror.
  • xmljson Convert multiple and large XML files to JSON. Written in Swift.
  • xpe Query HTML and XML with XPath expressions.
  • yaml-diff-patch Patch YAML with RFC 6902 JSON Patches. Generate a JSON Patch from two JSON documents or a YAML and a JSON document. Preserves style. Can be used as a TypeScript library.
  • yamlpath Query, modify, diff, merge, and validate YAML and JSON with YAML Paths. Also a Python library.
  • yq (kislyuk) jq wrapper for YAML, XML, and TOML.
  • zsv Slice, combine, reformat, flatten/unflatten CSV (TSV, DSV) files. Query them with SQL and jq filters. Convert between them, JSON, and SQLite 3. Also a C library.

Templating for structured text

Listed below are restricted programming language interpreters and templating tools that produce structured text output. They are generally intended to remove repetition in configuration files. They are distinct from unstructed templating tools like the jinja2 CLI program, which should not be added to this table.

  • CUE
    • Output format: JSON
    • Turing-complete: No
    • Syntax: Extended JSON
    • I/O: ?
    • Description: A constraint language for JSON configuration data. Can generate and validates JSON.
  • Dhall
    • Output format: JSON, YAML
    • Turing-complete: No
    • Syntax: Haskell-inspired
    • I/O: Limited to importing libraries from files and HTTP(S) URLs (with protection against leaking your data to the server)
    • Description: A statically-typed functional configuration language. Has a standard formatting tool.
  • jk
    • Output format: JSON, YAML, plain text
    • Turing-complete: Yes
    • Syntax: JavaScript
    • I/O: Disk I/O
    • Description: Generate configuration files using JavaScript (V8 VM).
  • Jsonnet
    • Output format: JSON, INI, XML, YAML, plain text
    • Turing-complete: Yes
    • Syntax: Extended JSON
    • I/O: None
    • Description: A functional configuration language. Has a standard formatting tool.
  • Nickel
    • Output format: JSON, TOML, YAML
    • Turing-complete: Yes
    • Syntax: Inspired by ML and JSON
    • I/O: Limited input is to be implemented
    • Description: A gradually-typed functional configuration language with contracts.
  • Pkl
    • Output format: JSON, YAML, macOS property list, Java .properties
    • Turing-complete: Yes
    • Syntax: Swift-inspired
    • I/O: The CLI can read environment variables and files, GET HTTP(S) URLs. It can import modules from files and HTTP(S) URLs.
    • Description: A command-line tool, Java library, and build tool plugin. Can generate code for Go, Java, Kotlin, and Swift. "Pkl vs. Other Config Languages".
  • rjsone
    • Output format: JSON, YAML
    • Turing-complete: No?
    • Syntax: Extended JSON
    • I/O: None
    • Description: A CLI tool for the JSON-e templating language.
  • ytt
    • Output format: YAML
    • Turing-complete: No
    • Syntax: YAML/Python hybrid
    • I/O: None?
    • Description: A templating tool for YAML built upon the Starlark configuration language.

See also

Extra: interactive TUIs

  • jid Explore JSON interactively with filtering queries like jq.
  • jiq Explore JSON interactively with jq. Requires jq.
  • lobar Process JSON and explore it interactively with a wrapper for lodash.chain(). An alternative to jq with JavaScript syntax.
  • sc-im A Vim-like spreadsheet calculator for CSV and TSV files.
  • VisiData Explore interactively data in TSV, CSV, XLS, XLSX, HDF5, JSON, and other formats. Introduction.

Extra: CLIs for single-file databases

  • Firebird
    • Description: Firebird is a FOSS database that can be used from a single file, like SQLite. "isql is a program that allows the user to issue arbitrary SQL commands".
    • File format: Binary
  • Fsdb
    • Description: A flat-file database for shell scripting.
    • File format: Text-based, TSV with a header or "key: value"
  • GNU Recutils
    • Description: "[A] set of tools and libraries to access human-editable, plain text databases called recfiles."
    • File format: Text-based, roughly "key: value"
  • SDB
    • Description: "[A] simple string key/value database based on djb's cdb disk storage and supports JSON and arrays introspection."
    • File format: Binary
  • sqlite3(1)
    • Description: "[A] simple command-line utility [...] that allows the user to manually enter and execute SQL statements against an SQLite database."
    • File format: Binary

License

The contents of this document is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. By contributing you agree to release your contribution under this license.

Disclosure

csv2html, hosts, Sqawk, jsonwatch, Remarshal, and initool are developed by the curator of this document.