rfortune 0.5.3

rFortune is a modern, cross-platform reimplementation of the classic Unix fortune program, written in Rust.

It displays a random quote or witty phrase from a plain text file, making it perfect for terminal startup messages, scripting, or just a bit of inspiration.

✨ New in v0.5.3

🧭 Smarter first-time initialization

• Added an interactive prompt when rfortune is launched for the first time and no configuration directory exists.
  • In interactive terminals, users are asked: Initialize rFortune now? [Y/n].
  • In non-interactive contexts (scripts, CI, etc.), initialization happens automatically.
• Prevents unintended directory creation and improves transparency during first setup.
• Initialization progress and results are displayed using ConsoleLog messages for consistency.

⚙️ Improved startup behavior

• The application now clearly reports which configuration directory is being used (dirs::data_dir() path).
• Overall initialization flow refined for clarity and better UX.

🚀 Features

• ✅ Cross-platform: works on Linux, Windows, macOS Intel and Apple Silicon
• ⚡ Fast and lightweight (native Rust binary)
• 📁 Simple input format: one or more lines per fortune, separated by %
• 🌹 UTF-8 support for multilingual content
• 🧩 Easily extensible
• 🧠 Built-in cache system to avoid showing the same fortune twice in a row
• ✨ New CLI with subcommands for config, file initialization and cache management

📦 Installation

🐧 AUR (Arch Linux)

yay -S rfortune
# or
paru -S rfortune

🍺 Homebrew (macOS/Linux)

brew tap umpire274/tap
brew install rfortune

🦀 Crates.io (Rust)

cargo install rfortune

📥 Download

Precompiled binaries are available in the Releases section.

🔐 GPG Signature

All release archives are cryptographically signed with GPG.

• .sig files contain the ASCII-armored detached signature for the corresponding archive.
• You can verify the archive with:

gpg --verify rfortune-<version>-<target>.tar.gz.sig rfortune-<version>-<target>.tar.gz

🔑 Public Key

The releases are signed with the following GPG key:

• Key ID: 423FABCE0A1921FB
• Fingerprint: 8118 9716 9512 2A32 1F3D C04C 423F ABCE 0A19 21FB
• Download: https://github.com/umpire274.gpg

To import the key from a keyserver:

gpg --recv-keys 423FABCE0A1921FB

Or from OpenPGP server:

gpg --keyserver keys.openpgp.org --recv-keys 423FABCE0A1921FB

Then verify the fingerprint:

gpg --fingerprint 423FABCE0A1921FB

🚀 Usage

rfortune [OPTIONS]
rfortune <SUBCOMMAND>

Running rfortune without subcommands prints a random fortune from the default file (rfortune.dat).

⚙️ First-time setup

When rfortune is launched for the first time and no configuration directory exists,
the application will ask whether to initialize its environment (creating the default
configuration and fortune files).
In non-interactive contexts, initialization happens automatically.

🧩 Options & Subcommands

💡 Examples

# Print a random fortune from the default file (rfortune.dat)
rfortune

# Print a random fortune from a specific file
rfortune --file ~/fortunes/misc

# Create the default configuration file in the user data directory
rfortune config init

# Open the configuration file in the system’s default text editor
rfortune config edit

# Open the configuration file with a specific editor (e.g. vi, nano, code)
rfortune config edit --editor vi

# Create a sample default fortune file (rfortune.dat)
rfortune file init

# Clear all cached last-used fortunes
rfortune cache clear

📁 File Format

Each fortune must be on one or more lines separated by %, like so:

%
The best way to get a good idea is to get a lot of ideas.
%
Do or do not. There is no try.
%
To iterate is human, to recurse divine.
%

You may optionally add a title at the top of the file by starting the first line with #. The title will be printed before the random quote:

# Murphy's Laws
%
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
%
If there's a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.
%

🔒 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.

© 2025 Alessandro Maestri

💡 Contributing

Pull requests are welcome! If you’d like to add support for more languages, improve performance, or fix bugs, feel free to fork the repo and contribute.

🙌 Acknowledgments

Inspired by the classic BSD fortune program. Built with ❤️ in Rust.