Framework Recipes

Framework Ecosystem Recipes

Use this skill when the user names a specific terminal UI framework or needs practical ecosystem guidance. Fetch current official docs when exact API syntax or version-specific behavior matters.

Rust recipes

Ratatui + Crossterm is the modern default for Rust full-screen TUIs. Structure apps around explicit state, event handling, and rendering functions. Use Crossterm for cross-platform terminal setup and events. Snapshot widgets at fixed sizes and integration-test the event loop through a PTY.

Guidelines:

• Keep terminal setup/cleanup in one guard.
• Render from immutable state where possible.
• Use constraints and layout primitives instead of absolute coordinates.
• Treat panics as terminal-cleanup events.

Python recipes

Textual fits substantial apps with widgets, CSS-like styling, workers, and test automation. Rich fits rich output, progress, markdown, tables, panels, and logging. prompt_toolkit fits shells, REPLs, completions, multiline editing, and custom key bindings. curses/ncurses fits classic dependency-light TUIs with careful cleanup.

Guidelines:

• For curses, use wrapper/finally cleanup and remember coordinates are y,x.
• For Textual, separate app state from workers and test with framework-supported pilots.
• For Rich, avoid full-screen complexity when rich scrollback output solves the problem.

Go recipes

Bubble Tea uses Elm-style Model, Update, and View. Pair with Bubbles for common controls and Lip Gloss for styles/layout. tview gives widget-rich apps over tcell. Use tcell directly for lower-level cell control.

Guidelines:

• Keep update logic pure where possible.
• Send long work through commands/goroutines that return messages.
• Test Update and View separately before PTY tests.

Node and TypeScript recipes

Ink is best for React-style terminal components, hooks, and component testing. Blessed fits DOM-like widget trees and manual screen lifecycle. Prompt libraries are often better than full-screen apps for short questionnaires.

Guidelines:

• Verify resize, mouse, and Windows behavior for the exact library version.
• Keep side effects out of render functions.
• Use PTY integration tests for flows that depend on terminal behavior.

.NET recipes

Terminal.Gui fits full-screen applications with views, keyboard navigation, mouse, themes, and layout. Spectre.Console fits rich CLI output, prompts, progress, status, trees, tables, and command app composition.

Guidelines:

• Choose Spectre.Console before Terminal.Gui when the UI can remain line-oriented.
• Abstract console I/O for tests.
• Provide non-interactive command equivalents for automation.

C/C++, Zig, and Swift recipes

ncurses remains the classic portable C TUI layer. notcurses is useful for modern visuals, rich cells, images where supported, and high-performance terminal graphics with fallbacks. FTXUI offers composable C++ components and layout. zig-vaxis is a modern Zig TUI toolkit with Unicode-aware terminal handling. SwiftTUI and related Swift terminal libraries fit Swift-native CLIs, but verify platform and terminal coverage carefully.

Guidelines:

• Low-level frameworks demand explicit cleanup, Unicode measurement, and capability fallback tests.
• Prefer maintained libraries with documented Windows, tmux, and Unicode behavior.
• Avoid image/graphics features as hard requirements unless the deployment terminal is controlled.

Reference files

• references/rust-python-go.md - Practical patterns for Ratatui, Textual/Rich/prompt_toolkit/curses, Bubble Tea/tview/tcell.
• references/node-dotnet-and-selection.md - Ink, Blessed, Terminal.Gui, Spectre.Console, migration, and selection gotchas.
• references/low-level-and-emerging.md - C/C++ ncurses/notcurses/FTXUI, Zig vaxis, SwiftTUI, and emerging toolkit cautions.