Use ANSI styling in output

[ericcornelissen]

Feature Request

Summary

By virtue of using clap, help and usage messaging is already ANSI styled. The software's own output could be improved by using ANSI styling as well. From the Command Line Interface Guidelines:

Use color with intention. For example, you might want to highlight some text so the user notices it, or use red to indicate an error. Don’t overuse it—if everything is a different color, then the color means nothing and only makes it harder to read.

Given the rather simple nature of this software, my suggestion would be to limit the use of ANSI styling to highlighting important information (e.g. what file system entry a line is about) or dimming optional information (e.g. error tips).

Suggestion

The following snippet aims to give an idea of how ANSI styling can be used to improve the software output. This suggestion is not necessarily complete nor final.

Note: Using HTML tags to give an idea of what would be styled, not necessarily how. Using <b> to indicate something deserves emphasis, <i> to dim text.

$ rm example_file example_dir
Would remove <b>example_file</b>
Cannot remove <b>example_dir</b>: Is a directory <i>(use '--dir' to remove)</i>

<b>1</b> would be removed <i>(use '--force' to remove)</i>, <b>1</b> error occurred

$ rm example_file example_dir --dir
Would remove <b>example_file</b>
Would remove <b>example_dir</b>

<b>2</b> would be removed <i>(use '--force' to remove)</i>, <b>0</b> errors occurred

$ rm example_file example_dir --dir --force
Removed <b>example_file</b>
Removed <b>example_dir</b>

<b>2</b> Removed, <b>0</b> errors occurred

Requirements

• Implementation should respect (some) NO_COLOR options, this should be verified in the no_color.rs test suite See Missing tests for ANSI formatting and NO_COLOR #14

[ericcornelissen]

While closed, suggestions for improvements/additions/changes to ANSI styling in the software's output are welcome. Either leave a comment here or create a new issue 🙂