tailgrid 0.3.4

Multi-tile tail viewer for terminal

 ┌──────┬──────┬──────┐   ████████╗ █████╗ ██╗██╗      ██████╗ ██████╗ ██╗██████╗
 │ tail │ tail │ tail │   ╚══██╔══╝██╔══██╗██║██║     ██╔════╝ ██╔══██╗██║██╔══██╗
 ├──────┼──────┼──────┤      ██║   ███████║██║██║     ██║  ███╗██████╔╝██║██║  ██║
 │ tail │ tail │ tail │      ██║   ██╔══██║██║██║     ██║   ██║██╔══██╗██║██║  ██║
 ├──────┼──────┼──────┤      ██║   ██║  ██║██║███████╗╚██████╔╝██║  ██║██║██████╔╝
 │ tail │ tail │ tail │      ╚═╝   ╚═╝  ╚═╝╚═╝╚══════╝ ╚═════╝ ╚═╝  ╚═╝╚═╝╚═════╝
 └──────┴──────┴──────┘
                          watch multiple files · grid-view · one terminal · zero deps

A minimal, dependency-free Python tool to monitor multiple log files simultaneously in a single terminal window. Like tail -f, but for up to 9 files at once in a clean tiled layout. ~250 lines of code. Tested on Ubuntu and macOS.

Features

• Zero dependencies (Python 3.10+ standard library only)
• Up to 9 tiles in a 3×3 grid layout
• Auto-layout based on file count
• Session history (saves last 10 sessions)
• Interactive file picker with directory browsing
• Tab completion for manual path entry
• Live updates (100ms polling)
• Terminal resize support

Viewer controls: +/- adjust lines | r refresh | q quit

Quick start

From PyPI:

pip install tailgrid
tailgrid

Quick start with path (auto-selects .txt and .log files, newest first):

tailgrid /var/log/       # up to 9 files
tailgrid /var/log/ 4     # only 4 newest files

From source:

git clone https://github.com/ferreirafabio/tailgrid.git
cd tailgrid
python -m tailgrid

Menu

  tailgrid - Multi-file tail viewer

    1) Browse directory
    2) Add paths manually
    3) Resume session

  Select 1-3 (q=quit):

Browse directory

Select 1 to browse a directory and pick files interactively:

  Directory path (b=back, q=quit): /var/log/

The file picker lets you select multiple files:

 Select files from: /var/log/
 ─────────────────────────────────────
 [x] auth.log
 [ ] boot.log
 [x] syslog
 [ ] kern.log
 [x] dpkg.log

 3/9 selected │ ↑↓/jk nav │ SPACE sel │ a all │ ENTER ok │ q quit

Layout is auto-selected based on file count:

• 1 file → Single
• 2 files → Choose vertical or horizontal
• 3-4 files → 2×2 grid
• 5-9 files → 3×3 grid

Resume session

Select 3 from menu to restore one of the last 10 sessions:

  Recent sessions:

    0) 2 file(s), 10 lines
       • /var/log/syslog
       • /var/log/auth.log
    1) 4 file(s), 10 lines
       • ~/app/logs/error.log
       • ~/app/logs/access.log
       • ~/app/logs/debug.log
       • ~/app/logs/info.log

  Select 0-1 (b=back, q=quit):

Sessions are stored in ~/.config/tailgrid/sessions.json.

Add paths manually

Select 2 to manually enter paths and pick a layout:

  Select layout:

    1) Single        2) Vertical      3) Horizontal    4) 2x2 Grid     5) 3x3 Grid
       ┌─────┐          ┌──┬──┐          ┌─────┐          ┌──┬──┐         ┌──┬──┬──┐
       │  1  │          │ 1│ 2│          │  1  │          │ 1│ 2│         │ 1│ 2│ 3│
       └─────┘          └──┴──┘          ├─────┤          ├──┼──┤         ├──┼──┼──┤
                                         │  2  │          │ 3│ 4│         │ 4│ 5│ 6│
                                         └─────┘          └──┴──┘         ├──┼──┼──┤
                                                                          │ 7│ 8│ 9│
                                                                          └──┴──┴──┘

  Layout 1-5 (b=back, q=quit): 4

  Enter 4 file path(s) (b=back, q=quit):

    [1] /var/log/syslog
    [2] /var/log/auth.log
    [3] ~/app/logs/error.log
    [4] ~/app/logs/access.log

  Starting with 4 file(s)...

Requirements

• Python 3.10+
• Linux or macOS (curses is not available on Windows)

License

Apache-2.0