Overview
mal‑cli is a high-performance terminal interface for the official MyAnimeList API, written in Rust. It provides fast, keyboard-driven navigation across anime and manga lists in a visually sleek TUI using the Ratatui crate. Designed for efficiency, it supports GPU-enhanced terminals and works across Linux, macOS, Windows, and musl environments.
Key Features
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Ratatui-based TUI: Modern, widget-driven interface with popups and keyboard navigation.
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Cross-platform support: GPU rendering (kitty, Windows Terminal 1.22+), compiled for Linux, macOS, Windows, and musl.
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Keyboard-first UX: Navigate with keys like s, r, Ctrl-p, and Esc; fast paging and popup switching.
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Easy installation: Available on crates.io, AUR (yay -S mal-cli), Debian and through github releases
Technologies Used:
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Rust: for performance and memory safety
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Ratatui: A Rust TUI crate
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Tokio async runtime: for API calls and event handling
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Crossterm: low-level terminal I/O
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serde / reqwest / tokio-rustls: for HTTP, JSON parsing, and TLS
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Image support: via ratatui-image for inline graphics on supported terminals
Skills Learned:
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Building complex async Rust apps with Tokio and handling event loops
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Crafting dynamic terminal UIs using Ratatui: popups, list views, threading
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Cross-platform packaging: managing builds for Linux (AUR), Debian, Windows, and musl
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Terminal graphics: integrating image rendering in TUI-friendly terminals
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Keyboard navigation ergonomics: designing intuitive keybindings and popup flows
Challenges and Lessons:
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Managing async events and popups required careful structuring to avoid input lag and race conditions
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Creating AUR/DPKG packages from Rust binaries taught me packaging nuances across Linux distributions
Outcome:
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Gained nearly 100 stars ⭐ on GitHub.
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Featured on Rust forums and r/linux for delivering a sleek, native-like TUI experience
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Continuously released updates (latest v0.2.1 on 2025‑06‑11), with support for multiple OS targets and easy installation across platforms