How to get nice formatting in the Rails console

Question

I want to get something like this to look nice:

>> ProductColor.all
=> [#<ProductColor id: 1, name: "White", internal_name: "White", created_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44", updated_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44">, #<ProductColor id: 2, name: "Ivory", internal_name: "Ivory", created_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44", updated_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44">, #<ProductColor id: 3, name: "Blue", internal_name: "Light Blue", created_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44", updated_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44">, #<ProductColor id: 4, name: "Green", internal_name: "Green", created_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44", updated_at: "2009-06-10 04:02:44">]

This doesn't work:

>> ProductColor.all.inspect
=> "[#<ProductColor id: 1, name: \"White\", internal_name: \"White\", created_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\", updated_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\">, #<ProductColor id: 2, name: \"Ivory\", internal_name: \"Ivory\", created_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\", updated_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\">, #<ProductColor id: 3, name: \"Blue\", internal_name: \"Light Blue\", created_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\", updated_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\">, #<ProductColor id: 4, name: \"Green\", internal_name: \"Green\", created_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\", updated_at: \"2009-06-10 04:02:44\">]"

And neither does this:

>> ProductColor.all.to_yaml
=> "--- \n- !ruby/object:ProductColor \n  attributes: \n    name: White\n    created_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    updated_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    id: \"1\"\n    internal_name: White\n  attributes_cache: {}\n\n- !ruby/object:ProductColor \n  attributes: \n    name: Ivory\n    created_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    updated_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    id: \"2\"\n    internal_name: Ivory\n  attributes_cache: {}\n\n- !ruby/object:ProductColor \n  attributes: \n    name: Blue\n    created_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    updated_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    id: \"3\"\n    internal_name: Light Blue\n  attributes_cache: {}\n\n- !ruby/object:ProductColor \n  attributes: \n    name: Green\n    created_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    updated_at: 2009-06-10 04:02:44\n    id: \"4\"\n    internal_name: Green\n  attributes_cache: {}\n\n"

Thoughts?

Outstand

Answer 1

The y method is a handy way to get some pretty YAML output.

y ProductColor.all

Assuming you are in script/console

As jordanpg commented, this answer is outdated. For Rails 3.2+ you need to execute the following code before you can get the y method to work:

YAML::ENGINE.yamler = 'syck'

From ruby-docs

In older Ruby versions, ie. <= 1.9, Syck is still provided, however it was completely removed with the release of Ruby 2.0.0.

For rails 4/ruby 2 you could use just

puts object.to_yaml

Olnton

this should be marked as the right answer since it's built in, can be used immediately, and most of all, simple. – Thrilling

This answer is outdated. See: #11572301 To make this work, you have to first execute YAML::ENGINE.yamler = 'syck'. – Ideography

Its now YAML::ENGINE.yamler = 'psych' – Caplin

This is similar to ryanb >> ProductColor.all >> y _ – Lagena

like @Thrilling said above, this is the best answer since it applies to situations where you ahve no access to an .irbrc, other console tools, or other configurations of the console (like, being a contracted dev with limited access to a production container/server) – Egerton

y method coming from ruby and still available in 2.5. irb(main):010:0> method(:y).source_location => ["/usr/local/Cellar/ruby/2.5.3_1/lib/ruby/2.5.0/psych/y.rb", 5] – Minne

Answer 2

You should try hirb. It's a gem made to to pretty format objects in the ruby console. Your script/console session would look like this:

>> require 'hirb'
=> true
>> Hirb.enable
=> true
>> ProductColor.first
+----+-------+---------------+---------------------+---------------------+
| id | name  | internal_name | created_at          | updated_at          |
+----+-------+---------------+---------------------+---------------------+
| 1  | White | White         | 2009-06-10 04:02:44 | 2009-06-10 04:02:44 |
+----+-------+---------------+---------------------+---------------------+
1 row in set
=> true

You can learn more about hirb at its homepage.

Purulent

ryanb's answer is basically what I was looking for, but this is too cool not to accept. – Outstand

While not an answer to the original question, it might be pointing out that you can add the hirb stuff to your ~/.irbrc so you don't have to require and enable it each time. – Exoskeleton

This gem is outdated now . – Marbleize

Is there a way to "easily" sort the columns of the output? I would love to force the column id to be first and updated_at & created_at at the end (if you add columns after the first migration the updated_at & created_at columns will not be at the end) – Allowable

Answer 3

Awesome print is nice too if you want an object indented. Something like:

$ rails console
rails> require "awesome_print"
rails> ap Account.all(:limit => 2)
[
    [0] #<Account:0x1033220b8> {
                     :id => 1,
                :user_id => 5,
            :assigned_to => 7,
                   :name => "Hayes-DuBuque",
                 :access => "Public",
                :website => "http://www.hayesdubuque.com",
        :toll_free_phone => "1-800-932-6571",
                  :phone => "[phone]",
                    :fax => "[phone]",
             :deleted_at => nil,
             :created_at => Sat, 06 Mar 2010 09:46:10 UTC +00:00,
             :updated_at => Sat, 06 Mar 2010 16:33:10 UTC +00:00,
                  :email => "[email protected]",
        :background_info => nil
    },
    [1] #<Account:0x103321ff0> {
                     :id => 2,
                :user_id => 4,
            :assigned_to => 4,
                   :name => "Ziemann-Streich",
                 :access => "Public",
                :website => "http://www.ziemannstreich.com",
        :toll_free_phone => "1-800-871-0619",
                  :phone => "[phone]",
                    :fax => "[phone]",
             :deleted_at => nil,
             :created_at => Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:32:10 UTC +00:00,
             :updated_at => Tue, 09 Feb 2010 20:05:01 UTC +00:00,
                  :email => "[email protected]",
        :background_info => nil
    }
]

To integrate it by default with your irb/rails/pry console, add to your ~/.irbrc or ~/.pryrc file:

require "awesome_print"
AwesomePrint.irb! # just in .irbrc
AwesomePrint.pry! # just in .pryrc

Flambeau

Can I use this gem with Rails 4 or 5 ?? I've found the following note in the github page: NOTE: awesome_print v1.2.0 is the last release supporting Ruby versions prior to v1.9.3 and Rails versions prior to v3.0. The upcoming awesome_print v2.0 will require Ruby v1.9.3 or later and Rails v3.0 or later. Does this mean that the gem is outdated with these versions and cause conflicts?? – Birmingham

Answer 4

>> puts ProductColor.all.to_yaml

Simply works fine!

Source: https://stackoverflow.com/a/4830096

Grume

This works great! I couldn't get the other top voted answers to work... I guess because I am using ActiveResource (API resources) – Lecroy

Answer 5

May also be noted that you can use:

j ProductColor.all.inspect

to output in Json format rather than Yaml

Daciadacie

this can fail depending on version of JSON/ruby, and the nice formatting may be needed in an environment where one cant have nice things – Egerton

This raise error: JSON::GeneratorError: only generation of JSON objects or arrays allowed – Komsa

Answer 6

I think this solution is the most accurate one. You should try this:

puts JSON.pretty_generate Entry.all.map(&:attributes)

This will give you a super nice output compare to YAML format:

[
  {
    "id": 44,
    "team_id": null,
    "member_id": 1000000,
    "match_id": 1,
    "created_at": "2019-04-09 15:53:14 +0900",
    "updated_at": "2019-04-09 15:53:14 +0900"
  },
  {
    "id": 45,
    "team_id": null,
    "member_id": 1000001,
    "match_id": 1,
    "created_at": "2019-04-09 15:53:36 +0900",
    "updated_at": "2019-04-09 15:53:36 +0900"
  },
  {
    "id": 46,
    "team_id": null,
    "member_id": 1000003,
    "match_id": 1,
    "created_at": "2019-04-09 15:56:40 +0900",
    "updated_at": "2019-04-09 15:56:40 +0900"
  },
  {
    "id": 47,
    "team_id": null,
    "member_id": 1000004,
    "match_id": 1,
    "created_at": "2019-04-09 15:56:48 +0900",
    "updated_at": "2019-04-09 15:56:48 +0900"
  }
]

Saprolite

Answer 7

Hi you can also try this in your script/console if

>> y ProductColor.all

not working for you.

Try this:

>> require 'yaml'

>> YAML::ENGINE.yamler = 'syck'

then

>> y ProductColor.all

Alliaceous

Answer 8

I had some troubles making it work so I'll add my two cents to awesome_print add this to your Gemfile, preferably in :development

gem 'awesome_print', require: 'ap'

then in

rails console

you can do

> ap Model.all That's it. However you can also add

require "awesome_print"
AwesomePrint.irb!

to your ~/.irbrc, this way awesome_print will be required anytime you open the console and you can simply do

Model.all without the need of typing ap

Stalagmite

Answer 9

You may also try the following for a group of objects

Object.all.map(&:attributes).to_yaml

This will give you much nicer output, like

---
id: 1
type: College
name: University of Texas
---
id: 2
type: College
name: University of California

Calling to_yaml on attributes rather than the object itself saves you from viewing the full contents of the object in the output

Or puts Object.last.attributes.to_yaml for a single object

Shorthand is also available: y Object.last.attributes

Merimerida

Answer 10

Use irbtools gem.

It will automatically format the the console output plus you'll get tons of great features.

Terrigenous

Nice! But I can't get it to format ActiveResource content... unless I am doing something wrong – Lecroy

Answer 11

You might want to define ProductColor's inspect method to return something that you find nice. For example:

def inspect
  "<#{id} - #{name} (#{internal_name})>"
end

After which the result of ProductColor.all will display as something like [<1 - White (White)>, ...]. Of course you should adjust the inspect method to your needs, so that it displays all the information you need in a style that you like.

Edit: also if the issue was the lack of line breaks in the output, you might try

require 'pp'
pp ProductColor.all

which should insert linebreaks where appropriate

Footgear

As a matter of fact require 'pp' isn't possible in rails console --sandbox. For some reason I get false when I try to require pp. Oops! it seems that pp is already required by default in rails console. I just did pp Model.connection_handler and got big pretty printed output. Thanks. – Selfrighteous

@Selfrighteous If require returns false, that just means that the file has been loaded already. – Footgear

Why the inspect is not displayed when doing just ProductColor.all? – Maciemaciel

Answer 12

To add to Alter Lago's suggestion for using AwesomePrint, If you can't/shouldn't/don't want to add the awesome_print gem to your project's Gemfile, do this:

gem install awesome_print

Edit ~/.irb.rc and add this:

$LOAD_PATH << '/Users/your-user/.rvm/rubies/ruby-1.9.3-p194/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/awesome_print-1.1.0/lib'

require 'awesome_print'

(Making sure the path and version are correct, of course)

Bile