Most of the time, a terminal is a productiveness powerhouse. But there’s extra to the terminal than instructions and configurations. Among all of the excellent open supply software program on the market, a few of it has been written just for fun. I’ve written about fun commands earlier than, however this text is about only one: the venerable cowsay command.
Cowsay is a configurable speaking (or pondering) cow. It accepts a textual content string and outputs a graphic of a cow speaking. Here’s a cow saying it loves Linux:
< I like Linux >
--------------
^__^
(oo)_______
(__) )/
||----w |
|| ||
To get that consequence, all I’ve to kind is:
$ cowsay "I love Linux"
Install cowsay on Linux
You can set up cowsay together with your bundle supervisor. On Debian, Mint, Elementary, and related distributions:
$ sudo apt set up cowsay
On Fedora:
$ sudo apt set up cowsay-beefymiracle
Cowsay command choices
Cowsay is a straightforward and foolish software. There’s no precise use for it besides to offer some diverting styling to your terminal. For occasion, fairly than simply making a cow say a enjoyable phrase, you may make a cow with wonky eyes say a enjoyable phrase. Type:
$ cowsay -e @@ Hello
You’ll get:
< Hello >
-------
^__^
(@@)_______
(__) )/
||----w |
|| ||
Or you may make it stick out its tongue. Type:
$ cowsay -T U Hello
You’ll see:
< Hello >
-------
^__^
(oo)_______
(__) )/
U ||----w |
|| ||
Better nonetheless, you’ll be able to mix the fortune command with cowsay:
$ fortune | cowsay
Now you may have an particularly good cow:
_______________________________________
/ we:
| |
| The single most necessary phrase within the |
world. /
---------------------------------------
^__^
(oo)_______
(__) )/
||----w |
|| ||
Beefy miracle
On Fedora, there’s an additional choice for cowsay that is additionally an unofficial undertaking mascot. For years, the Fedora installer has displayed slides selling open supply contributions. Because they have been styled after the interludes at drive-in film theaters, a standard cartoon character within the slides is an anthropomorphic sizzling canine.
In maintaining with that theme, you’ll be able to invoke a so-called beefy miracle with the Fedora model of cowsay:
$ cowsay -f beefymiracle Hello Fedora
You’ll find yourself with a wonderfully foolish consequence:
< Hello Fedora >
-------------- .---. __
, / ||||
|O___O | | ||||
// | _/ | | /
'--/----/| / | |-'
// // / -----'
// / /
// // / /
// / /
// // / /
/| ' / /
//___/ /
// || /
_ || '---'
/' / _.-
/ / --| |
'-' | |
'-'
Graphical cowsay
If you end up needing to have messages delivered to you from a graphical cow, there’s the xcowsay command. It’s a graphical program much like cowsay, and it accepts a textual content string that is entered by the consumer or piped from one other software like Fortune.
Fun Linux instructions
While cowsay shouldn’t be a helpful command, it’s a enjoyable command—the equal of desktop widgets to your terminal. It’s nice for a momentary distraction and enjoyable experiments with piping instructions (attempt piping ifconfig to cowsay, or lsblk, or mount, or something!). If you need to make your terminal extra enjoyable, attempt cowsay.
