* DONE The Quest for Simple Convenient Linux Image Viewers :blog:tech:foss:cli:linux:
CLOSED: [2024-10-17 Thu 16:41]
:PROPERTIES:
:ID:       linux-image-viewer-terminal
:CREATED:  [2024-10-15]
:END:
:LOGBOOK:
- State "DONE"       from "DRAFT"      [2024-10-17 Thu 16:41]
- State "DRAFT"      from              [2024-10-17 Thu 14:00]
:END:
I like simplicity,
but I also like convenience.
The Linux command line offers a lot of that,
though the latter sometimes needs some searching.
So also in the case of image viewers.

Over the course of the last months,
I have developed two primary use-cases:
Previewing a bunch of images directly in the terminal,
first with generic iterm, then within kitty -
images was one of the reasons prompting me to switch to it.
The second one is a quick popup window,
as KDE's ~showfoto~ is only marginally faster than the full-blown ~digikam~
which takes multiple seconds to start,
with a lot of bells and whistles and pop-ups.

In the terminal,
I quickly sorted out [[https://github.com/ichinaski/pxl][pxl]] and ~catimg~ because of inferior quality.
~cacaview~ converts images into colorful ASCII-Art,
but is very coarse and pops up if you are in a graphical session
and I found no way to turn that off,
making it unsuitable for my uses.
I took [[https://github.com/hzeller/timg][timg]], [[https://github.com/atanunq/viu][viu]] and [[https://github.com/stefanhaustein/TerminalImageViewer][tiv]]
into a detailed comparison using a [[https://forge.ftt.gmbh/janek/dotfiles/src/commit/109db5cebb4096ad3783650f675eb280e419da42/.local/bin/scripts/test-tiv][little helper script]] to vary the width as seen below:
[[img:timg-comparison.png]]

Both ~timg~ and ~viu~ supported kitty at the time of the test,
and while ~viu~ creates a smooth image in normal terminals,
the jaggedness of ~tiv~ preserves a lot more details.
~timg~ hits a very good middle ground on these,
and also allows previewing pdfs directly without conversion
and can show images in grids,
making it perfect for my previews.
~tiv~ supports a directory mode
while ~viu~ only shows one image at a time,
keeping ~timg~ as a clear winner.
~ueberzug~ also looked interesting,
but more appropriate for integration with other applications.
~lsix~ is also an interesting alternative to kitty with its sixel protocol
because it natively lists images in a grid with their names,
but so far kitty served me well enough
to not give this a second thought,
though recent developments highlight sixel as a more established standard.

For the popup version for use from ~xdg-open~,
I wanted quick opening,
ability to easily navigate back and forth in the folder of the image
and focus capture with quick quitting.
~w3m~ is interesting cause it is also a browser,
but seemed a bit clunky for this usecase.
~qiv~ fell out cause I tested it on KDE Plasma,
where the popup window did not capture focus.
~feh~ also did not cut it,
leaving me with the unmaintained ~sxiv~
and its various forks.

Today I experimented with ~nsxiv~, ~pqiv~ and ~vimiv~,
with the latter as clear winner
because of its ability to easily navigate between and within images
with familiar vim shortcuts.