BASH i okolice

Here is some more detail on the awesome tput command suggested in Ignacio's answer.

tput setab [1-7] # Set the background colour using ANSI escape
tput setaf [1-7] # Set the foreground colour using ANSI escape

Colours are as follows:

Num  Colour    #define         RGB

0    black     COLOR_BLACK     0,0,0
1    red       COLOR_RED       max,0,0
2    green     COLOR_GREEN     0,max,0
3    yellow    COLOR_YELLOW    max,max,0
4    blue      COLOR_BLUE      0,0,max
5    magenta   COLOR_MAGENTA   max,0,max
6    cyan      COLOR_CYAN      0,max,max
7    white     COLOR_WHITE     max,max,max

There are also non-ANSI versions of the colour setting functions (setb instead of setab, and setf instead of setaf) which use different numbers, not given here.

tput bold    # Select bold mode
tput dim     # Select dim (half-bright) mode
tput smul    # Enable underline mode
tput rmul    # Disable underline mode
tput rev     # Turn on reverse video mode
tput smso    # Enter standout (bold) mode
tput rmso    # Exit standout mode
tput sgr 0   # Reset all attributes

tput cup Y X # Move cursor to screen postion X,Y (top left is 0,0)
tput cuf N   # Move N characters forward (right)
tput cub N   # Move N characters back (left)
tput cuu N   # Move N lines up
tput ll      # Move to last line, first column (if no cup)
tput sc      # Save the cursor position
tput rc      # Restore the cursor position
tput lines   # Output the number of lines of the terminal
tput cols    # Output the number of columns of the terminal

tput ech N   # Erase N characters
tput clear   # Clear screen and move the cursor to 0,0
tput el 1    # Clear to beginning of line
tput el      # Clear to end of line
tput ed      # Clear to end of screen
tput ich N   # Insert N characters (moves rest of line forward!)
tput il N    # Insert N lines

tput bel     # play a bell

With compiz wobbly windows, the bel command makes the terminal wobble for a second to draw the user's attention.

echo „$(tput setaf 1)Red text $(tput setab 7)and white background$(tput sgr 0)” Looks like this on my Ubuntu terminal:

Red text and white background

Screenshot of colour terminal text

Use command sgr 0 to reset the colour at the end.

Performing multiple operations at once

tput accepts scripts containing one command per line, which are executed in order before tput exits.

Avoid temporary files by echoing a multiline string and piping it:

echo -e „setf 7\nsetb 1” | tput -S # set fg white and bg red See also

See man 1 tput See man 5 terminfo for the complete list of commands and more details on these options. (The corresponding tput command is listed in the Cap-name column of the huge table that starts at line 81.)