Flatito: Grep for YAML and JSON files

A kind of grep for YAML and JSON files. It allows you to search by key or value and get the matching entries with their line numbers.

Example

Meaning

Esperanto: singular past nominal passive participle of flati ('to flatter').

Installation

Install the gem and add to the application's Gemfile by executing:

$ bundle add flatito

If bundler is not being used to manage dependencies, install the gem by executing:

$ gem install flatito

Nixpkgs package

It is also available as nixpkgs thanks to @Rucadi

$ nix run nixpkgs#flatito

Usage

Usage:    flatito PATH [options]
Example:  flatito . -k "search string" -e "json,yaml"
Example:  flatito . -c "search value"
Example:  cat file.yaml | flatito -k "search string"
Example:  git diff | flatito -k "search string"

    -h, --help                       Prints this help
    -V, --version                    Show version
    -k, --search-key=SEARCH          Search by key
    -c, --search-value=SEARCH        Search by value
    -s, --case-sensitive             Case sensitive search
        --no-color                   Disable color output
    -e, --extensions=EXTENSIONS      File extensions to search, separated by comma, default: (json,yaml,yaml)
        --no-skipping                Do not skip hidden files
        --no-gitignore               Do not respect .gitignore
        --side=SIDE                  When input is a diff: before, after, or both (default: both)

Searches are case-insensitive by default. Use -s to force exact case matching.

Both -k and -c support regular expressions and can be combined:

# Find keys matching "database" with values containing "production"
flatito . -k "database" -c "production"

Searching inside a `git diff`

When the input piped through stdin is a unified diff (e.g. the output of git diff), flatito reports only the YAML/JSON entries whose lines were added (+) or removed (-) by the diff. Each result is prefixed accordingly.

# Show every changed key in the working tree
git diff | flatito

# Inspect a specific commit, branch range, or staged changes
git diff HEAD~1 | flatito -k "version"
git diff main..feature | flatito -c "production"
git diff --cached | flatito

# Pick a side: only what was added, only what was removed, or both
git diff | flatito --side=after
git diff | flatito --side=before

When the diff includes git index hashes (the default for git diff), flatito reads the original content via git cat-file so nested keys retain their parent context. If those blobs are unavailable, it falls back to reconstructing the changed regions from the diff hunks alone.

Development

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake test to run the tests. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.

To install this gem onto your local machine, run bundle exec rake install. To release a new version, update the version number in version.rb, and then run bundle exec rake release, which will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and the created tag, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.

Contributing

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/ceritium/flatito. This project is intended to be a safe, welcoming space for collaboration, and contributors are expected to adhere to the code of conduct.

License

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.

Code of Conduct

Everyone interacting in the Flatito project's codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms and mailing lists is expected to follow the code of conduct.