phstc/awesome_print

Awesome Print is a Ruby tool that makes complex data readable. When you're working with nested arrays, hashes, or database records in Ruby, the default output is often a wall of text that's hard to parse. This library formats that output with color coding and indentation, so you can instantly see the structure of your data. It's essentially a visual upgrade for your debugging workflow. At a high level, you call a single command (ap) on any Ruby object, and instead of printing a compressed mess, it displays the object broken out into clean, indented lines. Different data types are color coded, strings show up in one color, numbers in another, and special values like nil or false in red. You can customize the indentation depth, choose whether to sort keys, and even limit how many items in a large array get displayed. For long lists, it smartly collapses the middle section so you see the first few and last few entries without scrolling through hundreds of lines. This is designed for Ruby developers, particularly those working with Rails. If you're debugging a database query in the Rails console and want to inspect what came back, Awesome Print will lay out each record with its fields aligned and labeled. It also integrates directly with common Ruby tools like IRB and Pry (interactive consoles) and can be used inside Rails view templates. A founder or PM poking around a Rails app's console to check data would find this makes the experience far less intimidating. What's notable is how much control it gives you over formatting without requiring complicated setup. You can set personal defaults in a configuration file so every time you use it, the output looks exactly how you want. It also adds convenience methods like coloring strings with a simple .red suffix, which is handy for making terminal output more scannable.