Dev tools · alternatives · 2026
24 alternatives to Debut – a retro terminal PowerPoint clone
https://github.com/tombasche/debut As part of work I was tasked with doing a presentation on a part of the Agile Manifesto, so as a way to make it interesting I initially decided to do it as an animated CLI app. Then I remembered curses existed! And a weekend later I ended up with a mini-framework for doing your own presentations in the terminal complete with borders, colours and keyboard interaction. It's also 100% Python with no external dependencies, so feel free to clone it and run it as the readme states.
Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes. Debut – a retro terminal PowerPoint clone launched in 2020; newer entries below may have overtaken it.
- 1
Hi HN community, I’m Zach, founder and CEO of Warp, and am excited to show you Warp, a fast Rust-based terminal that’s easy to use and built for teams. As of today, Warp is in public beta and any Mac user can download it. It works with bash, zsh, and fish. The terminal’s teletype-like interface has made it hard for the CLI to thrive. After 20 years of programming, I still find it hard to copy a command’s output; I always forget how to use `tar`; and I always have to relearn how to move my cursor. To fix fundamental accessibility issues, I believe we need to start innovating on the terminal,…
2022 · warp.dev · its alternatives →
- 2
Not sure if I would post this for the last day of #marchintosh OR wait for tomorrow the 1st of April. Both apply equally. Anyway, here's a pet project of mine, I made it as a glued on for another pet project of mine, but it developed a life of it's own now and can soar skyward toward success, fame, and glory.
2024 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 3HG
Hi hi, I made a little Halloween themed game this week to show off my new terminal. You can play it in the browser. at https://joel.tools/halloween/ Two years ago, I started building an experiment tracking tool for myself as I have been venturing into ai research, and it has morphed into a terminal with rich content support and a bunch of fancy features. https://github.com/JoelEinbinder/snail/ I can't recommend people start using snail for important stuff today, but I think the game is fun and it shows off a lot of the capabilities of the…
2023 · joel.tools · its alternatives →
- 4
Screensavers for your terminal. Contribute to cxreiff/ttysvr development by creating an account on GitHub.
2024 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 5FA
I built Fresh to challenge the status quo that terminal editing must require a steep learning curve or endless configuration. My goal was to create a fast, resource-efficient TUI editor with the usability and features of a modern GUI editor (like a command palette, mouse support, and LSP integration). Core Philosophy: - Ease-of-Use: Fundamentally non-modal. Prioritizes standard keybindings and a minimal learning curve. - Efficiency: Uses a lazy-loading piece tree to avoid loading huge files into RAM - reads only what's needed for user interactions. Coded in Rust. - Extensibility: Uses…
Dec 2025 · sinelaw.github.io · its alternatives →
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Hi HN, I wanted to share my very first (insignificant) project written in Go: a little CLI tool that displays messages with an animated bunny holding a sign. I wanted to learn Go and needed a small, fun project to get my hands dirty with the language and the process of building and distributing a CLI. I've built a similar tool in JavaScript before so I thought porting it would be a great learning exercise. This was a dive into Go's basics for me, from package structure and CLI flag parsing to building binaries for different platforms (never did that on my JS projects). I'm starting to…
2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 9
Terminal emulator which mimics the old cathode display
2017 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 10IM
Try it at: ssh krnl.duetbrowser.com No sign up, totally free - no download. Let me know what you think. Prior art exists (brow.sh) but I wasn't satisfied with their graphical take. I wanted the raw, old skool terminal days of the early internet - BBS, and old green phosphor library comptuers - but running the modern web, with all the bells and jingle jangle whistles (JavaScript, etc). No funding, no VC, just 100% raw terminal fun. Not sure how long the demo will last, but try it out.
Jul 2026 · its alternatives →
- 11
A cross platform package to do curses-like operations, plus higher level APIs and widgets to create text UIs and ASCII art animations - peterbrittain/asciimatics
2016 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 12
Print your name in style. Contribute to arsham/figurine development by creating an account on GitHub.
2018 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 13WB
2016 · efounders.co · its alternatives →
- 14
Hello HN! Just wanted to share a small project I've been working for the last few months. It's a tool called Runal, a text-based creative coding environment that runs in the terminal. It works similarly as processing or p5js but it does all the rendering as text. And it can either be scripted with JavaScript or used as a Go package. It's open-source and cross-platform (linux, macOS, windows). It seems to me that text/ascii-art aesthetics are really popular in creative coding communities, so I though it would make sense to create a tool that runs on a platform which can render text only.…
2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 15
I made a Terminal UI for OpenSnitch[1], an interactive application firewall for Linux inspired by Little Snitch. I’ve always wanted to create a TUI and found the perfect excuse to make this for usage on one of my headless servers. I wrote this in Rust to force myself to learn more, viz. async features. Super open to feedback and contributions! [1] https://github.com/evilsocket/opensnitch
Nov 2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 16
So, I've never written a line of Rust in my life. I wouldn't know an `&mut this` from a mutandis. But I saw a tweet about a month ago that said, in this new era of AI, you'd be able to just take a library that you love, throw a TUI around it, and call it an app. So I spent about 200 bucks last month, here's what I came up with: Imbolc is a DAW that runs entirely in your terminal. It talks to scsynth over OSC and ships 58 instruments and 39 effects. VSTs are a work in progress, also GarageBand loops if you want to recreate "Umbrella". The codebase is about 60k? lines of Rust across 5 crates,…
Feb 2026 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 17
Hi HN, Up to the middle of 2025, I was the CEO/CTO of a startup called Textualize. Somehow I had managed to land seed funding for my Python libraries for fancy terminal output. We wrapped up after three years because the funding ran dry. I honestly thought I was sick of coding at that point. But it turns out I was sick of the stress and working all hours. A few weeks rest was all I needed. It was about that time that coding agents exploded, and I could no longer ignore them. I wasn't impressed with the UI these tools offered. Having worked in the terminal for a few years, I knew you…
Dec 2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 18
A terminal-based presentation tool with colors and effects. - vinayak-mehta/present
2020 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 19
I’ve had this idea for a new code editor chord grammar bouncing around in my head for over 2 years, and now I can finally release v0.1 of ane. You can run it one-shot from scripts or agents (`ane exec —chord…`) or use its full-on TUI editor. ane is pure Rust, and integrates tree-sitter and LSP to provide a pleasant and predictable terminal code editing experience. I’d love folks to try it out and give feedback! Thanks :)
May 2026 · github.com · its alternatives →
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This was by far the most common missing feature of the library since my first post, so I'm really happy I managed to figure it out. See the release for some code examples and a detailed changelog, and most importantly, have a great day!
2022 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 21
I put together a portfolio template that uses a retro CRT terminal aesthetic — green text on a black background, inspired by vintage computers. The idea was to capture the feel of classic command-line interfaces in a personal portfolio or CV.
2025 · sypert.gumroad.com · its alternatives →
- 22WS
This is the first project I haven't written a single line of code. The entire codebase was prompt generated in Cursor using mostly Claude Sonnet 4.5. It's also the first time I'm genuinely happy with the end result from AI coding. What do you think?
Dec 2025 · wordsnake.co · its alternatives →
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Generate your own excuse in a nifty comic style!
2017 · xkcd-excuse.com · its alternatives →
- 24KY
Hey HN! I wanted to practice "vibe coding" and see how far and fast I can go by only prompting, without actual coding. I decided to make a simple CLI app that scrapes web docs into a single md file (I was annoyed that LLM keeps writing Tailwind 3 code for a Tailwind 4 project). In just a couple of hours, the CLI app was ready! Then iterated on arguments for another couple of hours. Result: https://github.com/vladstudio/web2llm Then I decided to go further and "productize" the CLI by making a web app for it. Another half-day, and the web app is ready!…
2025 · web2llm.dev · its alternatives →
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Ranked by how close each launch is in meaning, then by votes. Prices were read from each product’s own site when checked and can change. Refine with your own description →