hicat

hicat is a modern replacement for cat that automatically highlights code with syntax coloring. It detects the programming language from the file extension and applies appropriate syntax highlighting powered by highlight.js.

The tool supports multiple ways to specify the language: automatic detection from file extension, manual specification via the -l LANG flag, or inference from piped input content. It includes a built-in pager for easy navigation through longer files (which can be disabled if needed).

hicat displaying syntax-highlighted code output
hicat displaying syntax-highlighted code output