How to Install and Use the ANSI Art Thumbnailer in GNOME

Have you ever wanted to easily view and appreciate the intricacies of ANSI art files on your GNOME desktop? Look no further than the ANSI Art Thumbnailer! This handy tool allows you to generate thumbnail images of ANSI art files (*.ans, *.nfo) directly within the GNOME file manager, making it convenient to preview and organize your collection. In this article, we’ll walk you through the installation process, provide troubleshooting tips, and suggest additional resources for enhancing your ANSI art experience.

Installation

Before we dive into the installation steps, please note that this guide assumes you are using a Linux distribution that includes the Nautilus file manager, which is the default file manager for GNOME.

1. Quit all Nautilus processes: nautilus -q (Even if you currently do not have any Nautilus windows open, it’s important to run this command to ensure a clean installation.)

2. Delete the thumbnails folder: rm -r ~/.cache/thumbnails (By deleting the existing thumbnails folder, we ensure that the new ANSI art thumbnails will be generated.)

3. Clone the repository: git clone https://github.com/1j01/ansi-art-thumbnailer.git (This will download the ANSI Art Thumbnailer repository to your local machine.)

4. Change directory: cd ansi-art-thumbnailer (Navigate to the cloned repository.)

5. Run make install: sudo make install (This command will execute the installation process. Please note that it uses pip to install necessary Python packages. If you do not have system-wide pip installation, please set it up first with sudo apt install python3-pip.)

Once the installation is complete, the ANSI art thumbnails should be visible in Nautilus, allowing you to easily identify and browse your ANSI art files.

Uninstallation

If you ever want to remove the ANSI Art Thumbnailer from your system, follow these steps:

1. Run make uninstall: sudo make uninstall (This command will execute the uninstallation process, removing the ANSI Art Thumbnailer from your system.)

2. Quit file managers and delete cached thumbnails folder (as done during installation): rm -r ~/.cache/thumbnails (Removing the cached thumbnails folder ensures that no remnants of the ANSI art thumbnails remain.)

Troubleshooting

Encountering issues or limitations with the ANSI Art Thumbnailer? Here are a couple of troubleshooting tips:

Thumbnails do not show up on some Ubuntu-based distributions (18.04 and later)

If you are using an Ubuntu-based distribution (18.04 and later) and the ANSI art thumbnails do not show up, the issue may be related to bubblewrap. To address this issue, you can use a workaround:

1. Install a bwrap wrapper in /usr/local/bin by running the following commands in the terminal:

bash
sudo wget -O /usr/local/bin/bwrap https://raw.githubusercontent.com/NicolasBernaerts/ubuntu-scripts/master/nautilus/bwrap
sudo chmod +rx /usr/local/bin/bwrap

However, it is recommended to consider updating to the latest version of Ubuntu, as this issue is already fixed.

ANSI art is not rendered properly

The current version of the ANSI Art Thumbnailer assumes UTF-8 encoding, which may not be common for ANSI art files. To improve compatibility with different encodings, the script is designed to detect the encoding automatically (TODO).

Credits

The ANSI Art Thumbnailer is based on mrc-em-gnome-thumbnailer, which provided useful resources such as the Makefile and repository structure. Additionally, the Thumbnailer utilizes Stransi for parsing ANSI escape sequences and Pillow for rendering the text.

License

The ANSI Art Thumbnailer is licensed under the MIT License. For more details, refer to the LICENSE.txt file.

See also

If you are interested in exploring further tools and resources related to ANSI art, consider the following:

• ansilove: ANSI art to PNG converter. This tool provides a wide range of format support and fonts, making it an excellent choice for converting ANSI art to other formats. There is also a library version available: libansilove.

• Textual Paint: ANSI art editor TUI inspired by MS Paint. This tool allows you to create and edit ANSI art directly from the command line, providing a nostalgic experience for ANSI art enthusiasts.

By exploring these additional resources, you can enhance your journey into the world of ANSI art. Enjoy the vibrant and creative possibilities that ANSI art brings to your digital environment!

If you have any questions or want to share your own experiences with the ANSI Art Thumbnailer, feel free to ask in the comments below.