# stefanhaustein/TerminalImageViewer

Small C++ program to display images in a (modern) terminal using RGB ANSI codes and unicode block graphics characters

Repository: https://github.com/stefanhaustein/TerminalImageViewer
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/terminalimageviewer
Language: C++
License: NOASSERTION
License Family: other
Topics: terminal-graphics, ansi-colors, cpp, ascii-graphics
Last push: 2026-08-03T01:19:25+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 66/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 95, release rhythm 8, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3799, "days_push": 31, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_license
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1683, forks 118 (observed 2026-08-28T04:05:21.870920+00:00)

## What it is
Terminal Image Viewer (tiv) is a small C++ command-line program that displays images directly in modern terminals using RGB ANSI codes and unicode block graphics characters. It improves resolution over half-block approaches by mapping 4x8 pixel cells to the best-matching unicode block characters with recalculated foreground and background colors.

## Use cases
- view images in the terminal without leaving the shell
- generate image thumbnails in a terminal file manager
- quickly preview a folder of images with tiv *.jpg
- display images over ssh where no GUI is available
- compare terminal image rendering quality with the -0 fallback mode

## When to choose
- you work primarily in a terminal or over ssh and need quick image previews
- you want higher-fidelity terminal rendering than half-block tools like timg
- you need a lightweight C++ tool with ImageMagick as the only dependency

## When to avoid
- you need true-color pixel-accurate image viewing in a GUI
- your terminal does not support unicode block graphics or RGB ANSI colors
- you need advanced image editing or format conversion features

## Facets
- artifact type: cli-tool
- maturity: active
- function: image-processing, cli, graphics
- domain: graphics, developer-tools
- platform: windows, cli, cross-platform
- tags: terminal-graphics, ansi-colors, unicode-block-graphics, image-viewer, thumbnails, cpp, command-line, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- stefanhaustein/TerminalImageViewer (main) score 66

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:21.870920+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T03:41:20.440971+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/stefanhaustein/TerminalImageViewer (fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:21.870920+00:00, sha 9adc03b2f7d0)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.