Cowsay

cowsay is a program that shows a ASCII picture of a cow saying a message inside the terminal.

To use cowsay, simply type:

$ cowsay "your message"

This script uses ascii art to show a cow in the terminal saying anything you tell it to say.

cowsay is not built-in to your terminal and in order to use it, you have to install it to your machine.

If you are using a linux machine, do the following steps:

$ sudo apt-git install cowsay

Useful Commands / Examples

  • -f cowfile specifies from which file to load ascii art
  • -e this followed by two characters specifies what to replace as the cows eyes (cowsay -e ^^ -turns the cows eyes into ^s)
  • -l gives a list of the different cowfiles that you can use

Example command

$ cowsay Moo

 ______ 
< moo! >
 ------ 
        \   ^__^
         \  (oo)\_______
            (__)\       )\/\
                ||----w |
                ||     ||
Example command
$ cowsay -f vader.cow "Luke, I am your udder"

 _______________________
< Luke, I am your udder >
 -----------------------
        \    ,-^-.
         \   !oYo!
          \ /./=\.\______
               ##        )\/\
                ||-----w||
                ||      ||

               Cowth Vader
Example command
$ cowsay -f stegosaurus hello


 _______
< hello >
 -------
\                             .       .
 \                           / `.   .' " 
  \                  .---.  <    > <    >  .---.
   \                 |    \  \ - ~ ~ - /  /    |
         _____          ..-~             ~-..-~
        |     |   \~~~\.'                    `./~~~/
       ---------   \__/                        \__/
      .'  O    \     /               /       \  " 
     (_____,    `._.'               |         }  \/~~~/
      `----.          /       }     |        /    \__/
            `-.      |       /      |       /      `. ,~~|
                ~-.__|      /_ - ~ ^|      /- _      `..-'   
                     |     /        |     /     ~-.     `-. _  _  _
                     |_____|        |_____|         ~ - . _ _ _ _ _>
Example command
$ cowsay -f tux hello


 _______
< hello >
 -------
   \
    \
        .--.
       |o_o |
       |:_/ |
      //   \ \
     (|     | )
    /'\_   _/`\
    \___)=(___/