bat

The tool works as a drop‑in replacement for the standard cat command, adding syntax highlighting for many programming and markup languages. It can display line numbers, non‑printable characters, and automatically detects the appropriate language when reading from standard input. When the output exceeds a terminal screen, it pipes the result to a pager such as less, though paging can be disabled with an option or configuration setting.

Integration with Git allows the tool to indicate which lines have been added, modified, or removed relative to the index, showing these changes in a sidebar. It also supports a range of command‑line options for customizing style, language selection, and line ranges, making it suitable for quick file inspection as well as more complex workflows.

The utility is designed for use in shells and scripts, and it can be combined with other command‑line programs—such as fzf, find, fd, ripgrep, and tail—to provide colored previews or continuous monitoring of log files. It behaves like cat when output is redirected or piped, ensuring compatibility with existing pipelines.