try-rs 🦀

A blazing fast, Rust-based workspace manager for your temporary experiments.

try-rs is a CLI tool designed to manage the chaos of temporary projects. Instead of cluttering your Desktop or /tmp with test1, new-test, and final-test, try-rs organizes them into date-prefixed directories, offering a robust TUI (Terminal User Interface) to create, navigate, and clean up your experiments.

💡 Inspiration

This project is a Rust port and re-imagination of the excellent try tool by Tobi Lütke.

While the original is a lightweight Ruby script, try-rs aims to bring the same philosophy, "Your experiments deserve a home", but with the performance, type safety, and modern TUI capabilities (using Ratatui) of the Rust ecosystem.

🤔 Why try-rs?

Feature	Description
🏎️ Blazing Fast	Built in Rust, it's compiled to a native binary. No more waiting for a script interpreter to start up.
🖼️ Rich TUI	A modern Ratatui interface makes browsing and managing projects a breeze.
✅ Type Safe	Say goodbye to runtime errors. Rust's strict compiler catches them before they become a problem.
Git-Aware	Clones repos with a single command, automatically naming them.

✨ Features

Fuzzy Search: Instantly find old experiments using a smart fuzzy matching algorithm.
Auto-Dating: Creates directories like 2025-12-17-rust-test automatically.
Git Integration: Paste a GitHub/GitLab URL, and it will auto-clone it into a dated folder.
- try-rs https://github.com/ratatui/ratatui → clones to .../2025-12-17-ratatui
Terminal UI: A beautiful TUI built with Ratatui to browse your projects.
Safe Deletion: Delete old experiments directly from the UI (Ctrl+D) with a confirmation popup.
Configurable: Supports XDG Base Directory specification (~/.config/try-rs/config.toml).

📦 Installation

Prerequisites

Rust & Cargo installed.
A shell (Fish, Zsh, Bash).

Building from source

git clone [https://github.com/tassiovirginio/try-rs.git](https://github.com/tassiovirginio/try-rs)
cd try-rs
cargo install --path . --bin try-rs

⚙️ Configuration

Setup the Shell Integration

Since try-rs needs to change your shell's current directory, it requires a small wrapper function.

🐟 Fish Shell (Recommended)

Create the file ~/.config/fish/functions/try-rs.fish:

function try-rs
    # Captures the output of the binary (stdout) which is the "cd" command
    # The TUI is rendered on stderr, so it doesn't interfere.
    set command (command try-rs $argv | string collect)

    if test -n "$command"
        eval $command
    end
end

(Optional) Create an abbreviation:

abbr --add try try-rs

🐚 Bash / Zsh

Add this to your .bashrc or .zshrc:

try-rs() {
    # Run the binary and capture stdout
    local cmd=$(command try-rs "$@")
    # Evaluate the cd command
    eval "$cmd"
}

Config File (Optional) By default, experiments are stored in ~/src/tries. To change this, create ~/.config/try-rs/config.toml:

# ~/.config/try-rs/config.toml
tries_path = "~/Development/playground"

🚀 Usage

Simply type try-rs (or your alias) in your terminal.

Key Bindings

Key	Action
`Type`	Filter the list (Fuzzy Search)
`↑` / `↓`	Navigate the list
`Enter`	Select directory (or create new if text doesn't match)
`Ctrl+D`	Delete the selected directory (triggers popup)
`Esc`	Cancel / Close Popup

CLI Commands

You can also bypass the UI:

Command	Description
`try-rs`	Opens the TUI
`try-rs <name>`	Create (or jump to) a named experiment
`try-rs <https://github.com/user/repo>`	Clones a repository into a dated folder

🤝 Contributing Pull requests are welcome! For major changes, please open an issue first to discuss what you would like to change.

📄 License MIT

try-rs 0.1.4