chameleon-data

An interactive CLI that replaces selected columns of a CSV / TSV / XLSX file with fake data generated by Faker. The result is saved in the same format as the input.

Installation

Published on PyPI as chameleon-data. Requires Python 3.11 or later. After installation, the chameleon and chameleon-example commands are available.

uv

# Install as a global CLI tool (recommended)
uv tool install chameleon-data

# Run once without installing
uvx --from chameleon-data chameleon -f data.csv

# Add as a dependency of another project
uv add chameleon-data

# Install into the current virtual environment
uv pip install chameleon-data

Upgrade / uninstall:

uv tool upgrade chameleon-data
uv tool uninstall chameleon-data

pip

pip install chameleon-data

# Upgrade / uninstall
pip install --upgrade chameleon-data
pip uninstall chameleon-data

To use it as a standalone CLI without touching other environments, pipx works too:

pipx install chameleon-data

From GitHub (development version)

uv tool install git+https://github.com/hidariutiwa/chameleon-data
pip install git+https://github.com/hidariutiwa/chameleon-data

To pin a specific version, use git+https://github.com/hidariutiwa/chameleon-data@<tag or commit>.

Usage

chameleon -f data.csv                 # saves to data_masked.csv
chameleon -f data.xlsx -o out.xlsx    # specify the output path
chameleon -f data.tsv -l en_US -s 42  # specify locale and seed

When run, you pick the columns to mask with a checkbox prompt, then choose a replacement type for each column. Each type is shown with a sample value, and you can type to filter the list.

Types the locale does not support (e.g. kana names and building outside ja_JP) are hidden from the list.

Identical values are replaced with identical fake values, so relationships between rows are preserved. Empty cells stay empty.

Sample data

chameleon-example   # writes a sample to ./example/example.csv
chameleon -f example/example.csv

Development

Uses uv.

uv sync
uv run chameleon -f example/example.csv
uv build   # builds a wheel and sdist into dist/

Release

Pushing a v* tag triggers GitHub Actions (.github/workflows/publish.yml), which publishes to PyPI via Trusted Publishing.

uv version --bump patch   # bump the version in pyproject.toml (minor / major also work)
git commit -am "chore: release v$(uv version --short)"
git tag "v$(uv version --short)"
git push origin main --tags

License

MIT