ponysay — cowsay reimplemention for ponies.

Today your terminal, tomorrow the world!

Installation on GNU/Linux (or other Unix implementations)

Download or clone the project. In the terminal, cd into the ponysay directory and ./setup.py --freedom=partial install or python3 setup.py --freedom=partial install. Superuser permissions might be required in order to run ./setup.py --freedom=partial install without --private, on most systems this can be achieved by running sudo ./setup.py --freedom=partial install. If installing only the completely free ponies is desired, --freedom=strict should be used instead of --freedom=partial. For additional information, an extensive manual in PDF is provided.

In order to use ponysay, run:

ponysay "I am just the cutest pony!"

Or if you have a specific pony in your mind:

ponysay -f pinkie "Partay!~"

Consult info ponysay, man 6 ponysay or ponysay -h for additional information. A Spanish manual is also available: man -L es 6 ponysay.

Arch Linux

The package is in the official repositories as community/ponysay. A Git version is also present, named ponysay-git in AUR.

Chakra

A git version of the package is available as ponysay-git in CCR, alongside a stable package called ponysay.

Gentoo Linux

There is a package for Gentoo, to make installation and updating simple. You can find it in this overlay. The package is named games-misc/ponysay.

Debian GNU/Linux and Ubuntu

The DEB file can be found on this PPA here.

Print a pony fortune upon terminal startup

This requires the fortune utility to be installed. It can install be from the distribution's repositories (might be named fortune-mod). Alternatively, one can just fetch the source code from here.

You can try this script or ponypipe to ponify fortunes.

Edit your ~/.bashrc and add this to the end of the file

fortune | ponysay

Afterwards, every time you open a terminal a pony should give you a fortune.

Pony quotes

Running ponysay -q will print a random pony saying one of its quotes from My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. The pony can be specified: ponysay -q pinkie. Just as with -f, -q can be used multiple times to specify a set of ponies from which a single one will be selected randomly.

When running ponysay -l or ponysay -L the ponies with quotes will be printed in bold or bright (depending on the used terminal).

Ponies in TTY (Unix VT)

If you have a custom colour palette edit your ~/.bashrc and add

if [ "$TERM" = "linux" ]; then
    function ponysay
    {
        exec ponysay "$@"
        #RESET PALETTE HERE
    }
fi

Read the PDF or info manual for more information.

Installation on Microsoft™ Windows®

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Dependencies

Runtime dependencies

coreutils: stty in coreutils used to determine size of the terminal.

python>=3: ponysay is written in Python 3.

Package building dependencies

gzip: Used for compressing manuals (suppressable with ./configure --without-info-compression --without-man-compression).

texinfo: Used for building the info manual (suppressable with ./configure --without-info).

python>=3: The installation process is written in Python 3.

Run ./dependency-test.sh if things are not working for you.

FAQ

Q: The output looks like a mess in (TTY/PuTTY/other)!

A: Unfortunately we cannot make it perfect, see issue 1. But we have done a lot, read more about how to get the best of the current state of the art has to offer in the manual.

Q: The output looks like a mess in (xfce4-terminal/mate-terminal/xterm/[...]) with (this) font!

A: We use blocks for printing the ponies, if the blocks are misaligned, or if you do not use a truly monospaced font with aligned blocks try another monospaced font, such as 'Fixed [...]' or 'Liberation Mono.'

Q: You are missing (my-favourite-pony)!

A: Ask and we'll add!

Q: Which programs do you use to generate the pony files?

A: The pony files are in fact mostly a bunch of selected browser ponies, converted using util-say, Other are taken from desktop ponies, and the others are created specifically for ponysay.

The PDF manual should answer most of your questions.