Markdown CLI viewer with VI keybindings

juancn · 2026-02-10T18:19:04 1770747544

A screenshot would be a nice addition to the readme.

It seems is only pure text (no support for image extensions of a terminal, just a link to the image), based on this: https://github.com/taf2/mdvi/blob/master/src/renderer.rs

It looks nice and clean code.

taf2 · 2026-02-10T19:47:29 1770752849

Thanks i added a screenshot and in 0.2 you can see images now in the cli too

m4r71n · 2026-02-10T23:08:03 1770764883

The screenshot you added uses a transparent terminal where you can see your Discord chat in the background. You might want to remove that ;-)

forty · 2026-02-10T23:37:47 1770766667

Why would someone use a transparent window background? Are people really reading the window behind it at the same time as the foreground window?

alextingle · 2026-02-11T01:59:39 1770775179

Example: If a build is going on in the background, I can see when it stops.

skydhash · 2026-02-11T02:58:49 1770778729

You can use `build-tool; tput bel` to hear the bell when it ends. Some terminal allows to set the urgent flag on the windows when the bell rings.

forty · 2026-02-11T06:53:24 1770792804

Yeah I have used desktop notifications for such things (via notify-send etc), but I'm going to accept this explanation for transparent background as it makes some sense to me.

taf2 · 2026-02-11T01:00:50 1770771650

pretty fun right :)

keithnz · 2026-02-11T02:50:46 1770778246

no.... and your screen shot completely fails to show off your tool

nikvdp · 2026-02-11T09:41:21 1770802881

If you like the man page aesthetic, using pandoc with groff is the most readable way to read markdown on the terminal I've found:

    mdless() {
        if command -v pandoc >/dev/null; then
            if [[ -z "$1" ]]; then
                cat | pandoc -s -f markdown -t man | groff -T utf8 -man | less
            else
                pandoc -s -f markdown -t man "$*" | groff -T utf8 -man | less
            fi
        else
            less "$@"
        fi
    }

jonaustin · 2026-02-10T23:50:56 1770767456

Glow is pretty great and has been around for a while:

https://github.com/charmbracelet/glow

pss314 · 2026-02-10T21:33:13 1770759193

Markdown reader using find, fzf and lnav

  find . \( -path '*/vendor/*' -or -path '*/.git/*' -or -path '*/node_modules/*' \) -prune -or -type f -name "*.md" -print | fzf | xargs lnav

In the above command, the find command excludes directories such as "vendor" (golang), ".git" (git) and "node_modules" (nodejs). The lnav itself provides the markdown support https://lnav.org/2022/08/06/markdown-support.html

llimllib · 2026-02-10T20:03:01 1770753781

I created one I like: https://github.com/llimllib/mdriver

it can echo images with kitty image protocol, and streams the output, which I use to show LLM output as it arrives

It doesn't handle paging - you can pipe it to `less` or whatever pager for that

smoyer · 2026-02-11T02:04:07 1770775447

Here's the one I use a lot ... And the underlying `glamour` library is great for programmatic markdown display: https://github.com/charmbracelet/glow.

joshka · 2026-02-11T04:12:40 1770783160

Hey if there's significant overlap, what about coming and collab-ing on https://github.com/joshka/tui-markdown? (crate + cli, rust / ratatui / crossterm based)

Blackarea · 2026-02-10T21:59:08 1770760748

3 source files, nice code, no vibe-coding slob, nice little project... That's rare these days

socceroos · 2026-02-11T04:57:57 1770785877

I personally would have liked colours support like Glow has. At least the ability to theme it so we can add colours if we want. Nice tool, though.

kalterdev · 2026-02-10T19:25:55 1770751555

Isn’t vi good enough?

w0m · 2026-02-10T20:38:30 1770755910

NeoVim w/ render-markdown.nvim

(not to poo on OP - I dig a clean TUI renderer, I have BAT installed for a reason)

Blackarea · 2026-02-10T21:53:31 1770760411

Bat is nice. Oh dang now i have to try this plugin. I remember trying a couple of similar ones that got me so frustrated that i abandoned the idea of markdown viewers in nvim... Here we go again XD

chrysoprace · 2026-02-11T01:28:51 1770773331

render-markdown.nvim is very nice and works with GitHub Flavoured Markdown, even down to some of the newer features like INFO, IMPORTANT, etc. quotes.

munk-a · 2026-02-10T19:59:37 1770753577

No, I prefer emacs.

kurtis_reed · 2026-02-11T03:32:58 1770780778

vi was mentioned because this software has "VI keybindings". no one asked what you prefer.

syngrog66 · 2026-02-10T20:41:36 1770756096

makes sign of cross, and hisses

metalliqaz · 2026-02-11T02:23:17 1770776597

It's funny because the whole idea of Markdown is that it is readable both as text and rendered, so it shouldn't require a terminal renderer.

maxsimb · 2026-02-10T18:26:26 1770747986

https://github.com/Vagab/mark similar tool, but with editing enabled also!

eyjafjalajokull · 2026-02-10T19:34:55 1770752095

It’s funny to see markdown tools popping up with the rise of agents.

verdverm · 2026-02-10T18:26:15 1770747975

https://github.com/charmbracelet/glamour

Charm Glamour with a view port uses basic vi keybinds as well

gigatexal · 2026-02-10T22:31:38 1770762698

You had me at vi bindings

syngrog66 · 2026-02-10T20:40:52 1770756052

ie. vim

taf2 · 2026-02-10T21:55:29 1770760529

aka view

ghost-of-dmr · 2026-02-11T00:25:48 1770769548

Markdown is already readable as-is. How is this any different from running "more my_file.md" ?

Stop trying to re-invent the wheel when the tools are already there.

collinvandyck76 · 2026-02-11T02:40:22 1770777622

This is an odd comment on "Hacker" news. There's a joy to be had in making things like this, even though there are better alternatives and it's often a weird thing to do in the first place. I often do not post the things I create here and elsewhere because I dread this kind of feedback. What do you hope OP takes away from your post?