Charm Gum Has a Free API That Most Developers Dont Know About

# bash# terminal# devtools# go
Charm Gum Has a Free API That Most Developers Dont Know AboutAlex Spinov

Gum by Charm is a tool for building beautiful shell scripts. It provides interactive prompts,...

Gum by Charm is a tool for building beautiful shell scripts. It provides interactive prompts, spinners, file pickers, and styled text — all from bash.

Interactive Prompts 

# Text input
NAME=$(gum input --placeholder "Your name")

# Multi-line text
BIO=$(gum write --placeholder "Tell us about yourself")

# Confirm
gum confirm "Delete all files?" && rm -rf ./temp

# Choose from list
COLOR=$(gum choose "Red" "Green" "Blue" "Yellow")

# Multi-select
FRAMEWORKS=$(gum choose --no-limit "React" "Vue" "Svelte" "Angular")

# File picker
FILE=$(gum file .)

# Filter (fuzzy search)
RESULT=$(cat list.txt | gum filter)
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Styled Output 

gum style --foreground 212 --border-foreground 57 --border double --padding "1 2" "Hello, World!"

# Join styles
A=$(gum style --foreground 212 "Column A")
B=$(gum style --foreground 48 "Column B")
gum join --horizontal "$A" "$B"
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Spinners 

gum spin --spinner dot --title "Deploying..." -- npm run deploy
gum spin --spinner moon --title "Building" -- make build
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Combine in Scripts 

#!/bin/bash
NAME=$(gum input --placeholder "Project name")
TYPE=$(gum choose "Next.js" "Remix" "SvelteKit")
gum confirm "Create $TYPE project ?" || exit 0
gum spin --title "Creating..." -- npx create-next-app "$NAME"
gum style --foreground 48 "Project $NAME created!"
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Key Features

  • Beautiful interactive prompts
  • Styled text and borders
  • Spinners for loading
  • File picker and fuzzy filter
  • Composable in any shell script

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