choose

A command-line tool for selecting fields from text with an intuitive syntax inspired by Python list slicing. A more user-friendly alternative to cut that often outperforms awk for simple field selection.

Features

• Python-like slicing syntax with ranges and negative indices
• Zero-indexed field numbering with support for fields from the end of a line
• Fast performance compared to traditional awk and cut
• Custom field separators including regular expressions
• Simple, readable command syntax

Basic usage

# Select the first field.
choose 0

# Select fields 0, 1, and 2.
choose 0:3

# Select the last field using negative indexing.
choose -1

# Select multiple specific fields.
choose 0 2 4

# Use a custom field separator.
choose -f ':' 0 4