Software Engineering Radio - the podcast for professional software developers SE Radio 669: Will McGugan on Text-Based User Interfaces
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Jun 4, 2025 Will McGugan, CEO of Textualize and creator of the Rich and Textual libraries, dives into the world of text-based user interfaces. He discusses how these interfaces enhance developer workflows and reduce distractions. The conversation includes advanced features like progress bars and the use of CSS for layouts in terminal applications. McGugan also addresses character encoding challenges and the importance of caching in improving performance. He encourages innovation in combining TUIs with AI applications, offering developers practical strategies and insights.
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CLI versus TUI Explained
- A CLI is a command line interface where you type commands and get responses. A TUI is a text-based interface inside the terminal with interactive elements like buttons and scroll bars.
Benefits of TUIs and CLIs
- TUIs and CLIs are very responsive and keep you in flow without context switching. They pop up quickly and disappear fast when not needed.
Harlequin.sh Database TUI
- Harlequin.sh is a popular Textual app for database interaction with a tree view and SQL syntax highlighting. Users navigate tables and see formatted query results directly in the terminal.