PromptPlus

PromptPlus transforms your console apps with a modern .NET library that delivers polished, interactive experiences — from text input with history and searchable lists to masked fields, date/time pickers, file browsers, progress bars, charts, and more — all streamlined through one sleek fluent API.

Highlights

20+ interactive controls — from a simple key-press to multi-column tables and tree browsers
6 output-only widgets — render sliders, calendars, banners, charts and more without blocking
Fluent API — every control is configured with readable method chains
Two-layer config — set defaults once with PromptPlus.Config, override per control with .Options()
Abort anywhere — Esc aborts any control; result carries an IsAborted flag
History persistence — last confirmed value saved and pre-loaded automatically
Terminal-safe — auto-detects size, re-renders on resize, enforces 80×10 minimum gracefully
Cross-platform — Windows, Linux, macOS; .NET 8, 9 and 10
Demo Mode — script keyboard input to auto-record GIFs of your controls, no human needed (AutoDemoSamples)

What's new in the latest version

📢 Release Note – PromptPlus V.6.X Beta

🚀 Beta Phase Launch

The 6.X version officially enters the Beta phase.
Purpose: validate new features, adjustments, and improvements currently under development.

🛠️ Source Code

Available in the main branch.

📦 NuGet Package

Latest update: 6.0.0-Beta[seq].
To install, you must enable the pre-release option in NuGet.

💬 Community Feedback

This space is open for:
- Sharing feedback
- Reporting issues
- Suggesting enhancements

Installation

PromptPlus 6.x is currently in Beta — you must enable pre-release packages to install it.

dotnet add package PromptPlus --prerelease

Or via the Package Manager Console:

Install-Package PromptPlus -IncludePrerelease

Quick Start

using PromptPlusLibrary;

// Ask for a name
var nameResult = PromptPlus.Controls.Input("Your name").Run();
if (nameResult.IsAborted) return;

// Choose a color
var colorResult = PromptPlus.Controls
    .Select<string>("Favorite color")
    .AddItems(["Red", "Green", "Blue"])
    .Run();

// Deconstruct result
var (color, aborted) = colorResult;
if (!aborted)
    PromptPlus.Console.WriteLine($"Hello {nameResult.Content}, you chose {color}!");

💡 Tip: Every control returns ResultPrompt<T>. Use .Content for the value, .IsAborted to detect Esc, or deconstruct with var (value, aborted) = result.

Two-Layer Configuration

Layer 1 — Global defaults (applied to all controls)

using PromptPlusLibrary;

PromptPlus.Config.PageSize = 8;
PromptPlus.Config.HideAfterFinish = true;

Layer 2 — Per-control override (`.Options()` fluent method)

PromptPlus.Controls
    .Input("Notes")
    .Options(o => o
        .HideAfterFinish(false)
        .ShowTooltip(false))
    .Run();

Per-control settings always win over global config. See docs/global-behaviors.md for the full property reference.

Persist config to disk

// Write PromptPlus.config to the current directory
PromptPlus.Config.ToFile(".");

On next run, PromptPlus automatically reads PromptPlus.config from the working directory.

Global Behaviors

Behavior	Observable effect
Terminal resize detection	Control re-renders its own area; surrounding output is untouched
Minimum terminal size (80×10)	Shows a resize prompt and waits — never crashes
Culture isolation	`DefaultCulture` applied only during `.Run()`; thread culture always restored
Single-line rendering	Newlines stripped; sliding window with `…` when value is too wide
History persistence	Last confirmed value saved to disk; pre-loaded on next run
HideAfterFinish	Control UI erased after confirmation; only the final answer line remains
HideOnAbort	Control UI erased when user presses Esc
Ctrl+C handling	Intercepted by default → triggers abort; set `RemoveHandlerCtrlC = true` to pass to OS
Tooltip visibility	`ShowTooltip = true` shows keyboard hints below the prompt
Abort key hint	`ShowMessageAbortKey = true` includes the abort-key name in the tooltip
Auto-initialization	PromptPlus initializes on first access: detects terminal, loads config, registers error log

Localization

PromptPlus ships 11 built-in locales as embedded resources. The active locale is selected automatically from CultureInfo.CurrentCulture; override it at any time with:

PromptPlus.Config.DefaultCulture = new CultureInfo("pt-BR");

Culture code	Language
(default)	English
`pt-BR`	Portuguese (Brazil)
`de-DE`	German
`es-ES`	Spanish
`fr-FR`	French
`it-IT`	Italian
`ja-JP`	Japanese
`ko-KR`	Korean
`nl-BE`	Dutch (Belgium)
`ru-RU`	Russian
`zh-CN`	Chinese (Simplified)

If DefaultCulture is set to a culture that has no embedded resource, PromptPlus falls back to the default English strings.

Adding a custom locale

If your target culture is not listed above, you can provide your own satellite resource:

Copy PromptPlus/Resources/PromptPlusResources.resx from the source tree (or extract it from the NuGet package).
Translate every message value to your language, keeping the existing key names and format placeholders unchanged.
Compile the .resx file into a binary .resources file — see Compiling .resx files (Microsoft docs).
Place the compiled file, named PromptPlus.<culture-code>.resources (e.g. PromptPlus.pl-PL.resources), in the same directory as your application binaries.

PromptPlus will discover and load it automatically at runtime via the standard .NET resource fallback chain.

Controls Reference

Control	Factory method	Returns
Text input	`PromptPlus.Controls.Input(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<string>`
Secret / password	`PromptPlus.Controls.Secret(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<string>`
Key press	`PromptPlus.Controls.KeyPress(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<ConsoleKeyInfo?>`
Confirm (yes/no)	`PromptPlus.Controls.Confirm(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<ConsoleKeyInfo?>`
Single select	`PromptPlus.Controls.Select<T>(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<T>`
Multi select	`PromptPlus.Controls.MultiSelect<T>(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<IEnumerable<T>>`
Table	`PromptPlus.Controls.Table<T>(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<TableResult<T>>`
Multi-table	`PromptPlus.Controls.MultiTable<T>(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<IEnumerable<TableResult<T>>>`
Tree	`PromptPlus.Controls.Tree<T>(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<T>`
Multi-tree	`PromptPlus.Controls.MultiTree<T>(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<IEnumerable<T>>`
File browser	`PromptPlus.Controls.File(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<FileInfo>`
Multi-file	`PromptPlus.Controls.MultiFile(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<IEnumerable<FileInfo>>`
Calendar	`PromptPlus.Controls.Calendar(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<DateTime>`
Progress bar	`PromptPlus.Controls.ProgressBar(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<double>`
Task	`PromptPlus.Controls.Task(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<StateTask>`
Multi-tasks	`PromptPlus.Controls.MultiTasks(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<IEnumerable<MultiTaskResult>>`
Chart bar	`PromptPlus.Controls.ChartBar(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<double>`
Mask — string	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskEdit(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<string>`
Mask — integer	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskInteger(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<int>`
Mask — long	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskLong(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<long>`
Mask — decimal	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDecimal(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<decimal>`
Mask — decimal currency	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDecimalCurrency(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<decimal>`
Mask — double	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDouble(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<double>`
Mask — double currency	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDoubleCurrency(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<double>`
Mask — date & time	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDateTime(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<DateTime>`
Mask — date only	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDate(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<DateTime>`
Mask — DateOnly	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskDateOnly(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<DateOnly>`
Mask — time only	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskTime(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<DateTime>`
Mask — TimeOnly	`PromptPlus.Controls.MaskTimeOnly(prompt)`	`ResultPrompt<TimeOnly>`

Widgets Reference

Widgets are output-only — no user input, no ResultPrompt. Banner and Dash render immediately; the fluent widgets (Slider, Calendar, Switch, ChartBar) render when you call .Show().

Widget	Factory method	Output
Slider (display)	`PromptPlus.Widgets.Slider(value, min, max, fracionaldig)`	`ISliderWidget`
Calendar (display)	`PromptPlus.Widgets.Calendar(dateref)`	`ICalendarWidget`
Switch (display)	`PromptPlus.Widgets.Switch(value)`	`ISwitchWidget`
Banner	`PromptPlus.Widgets.Banner(text)`	immediate render
Dash separator	`PromptPlus.Widgets.Dash(text)`	immediate render
Chart bar (display)	`PromptPlus.Widgets.ChartBar()`	`IChartBarWidget`

ConsolePlus Integration

ConsolePlus gives you a rock-solid rendering foundation: styled output, markup, colors, widgets, cursor/screen control, and capability detection. PromptPlus is the complementary product that builds on top of that foundation to deliver intelligent, professional, interactive console controls — the kind of rich prompts you'd otherwise have to build by hand.

In one sentence: ConsolePlus is how you render; PromptPlus is how you interact.

Why two products?

ConsolePlus deliberately stays focused on rendering primitives. It ships the input building blocks you need for simple scenarios — ReadLine, ReadKey, and even Emacs-style line editing — but it intentionally stops short of full interactive UI.

PromptPlus picks up exactly where those primitives end, adding stateful, keyboard-driven controls with validation, paging, filtering, history, and theming — all rendered through the same ConsolePlus engine, so colors, markup, and capability fallbacks behave identically.

How they fit together

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                  Your app                    │
├────────────────────────┬─────────────────────┤
│      PromptPlus        │                     │
│  (interactive controls)│                     │
│  Input · Select · ...  │   ← optional layer  │
├────────────────────────┴─────────────────────┤
│                 ConsolePlus                  │
│  output · markup · colors · widgets · ANSI   │
│  cursor/screen · capability detection        │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────┘

PromptPlus references ConsolePlus and reuses its console driver directly. In fact, PromptPlus.Console is the ConsolePlus driver — so anything you learned in the Writing Output, Markup, and Colors guides applies unchanged inside PromptPlus.

The `PromptPlus` entry point

Just like ConsolePlus, PromptPlus is a static facade. It exposes four members:

Member	Type	Purpose
`PromptPlus.Console`	`IConsole`	The shared ConsolePlus console driver
`PromptPlus.Controls`	`IControls`	Factory for interactive controls
`PromptPlus.Widgets`	`IWidgets`	Banners, dashes, calendar and other visual widgets
`PromptPlus.Config`	`IPromptPlusConfig`	Global configuration (themes, behavior)

using ConsolePlusLibrary;
using PromptPlusLibrary;

// Rendering — identical to ConsolePlus
PromptPlus.Console.WriteLine("[Teal]Powered by ConsolePlus[/]");

// Widgets
PromptPlus.Widgets.Banner("PromptPlus", Color.Bisque);

PromptPlus.Console exposes the same IConsole driver as ConsolePlus. Use it to write styled text, manage cursor, and compose output alongside your controls:

using ConsolePlusLibrary;
using PromptPlusLibrary;

// These two are the same object:
PromptPlus.Console.WriteLine("Hello, [bold]world[/]!");
ConsolePlus.WriteLine("Hello, [bold]world[/]!");

Samples

The samples/ folder contains runnable projects for every control and widget — one sample per concept — plus AutoDemoSamples, which scripts a walkthrough of several controls using Demo Mode and is the actual source used to record the demo GIF above.

Documentation

Page	Description
Getting Started	Install, first app, config walkthrough
Architecture	Entry points, lifecycle, ResultPrompt
Global Behaviors	Full IPromptPlusConfig reference
Keyboard Bindings	Emacs shortcuts, physical key reference
Visual Symbols	Symbol catalog
Global Styles	Style override API
Widgets	Output-only widgets guide
Demo Mode	Scripted keyboard input for recording GIFs/videos of console apps
Controls index	All pages in one place
API Reference	Auto-generated API docs

Architecture Decision Records (ADR)

PromptPlus documents its significant architectural and design decisions as Architecture Decision Records (ADR), following the AdrPlus convention. Each record captures the context, the decision, the alternatives considered, and the consequences — so the reasoning behind the library's design stays traceable over time.

👉 See the ADR index for the full list of decisions.

Code of Conduct

This project has adopted the code of conduct defined by the Contributor Covenant to clarify expected behavior in our community. For more information see the Code of Conduct.

Contributing

See the Contributing guide for developer documentation.

Special thanks

ividyon for their continued contributions to product improvement.

License

PromptPlus is licensed under the MIT License.

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 560 Commits
.github/workflows		.github/workflows
docs		docs
media		media
samples		samples
src		src
tests		tests
.gitattributes		.gitattributes
.gitignore		.gitignore
CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md		CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md
CONTRIBUTING.md		CONTRIBUTING.md
LICENSE		LICENSE
NugetREADME.md		NugetREADME.md
PromptPlus.slnx		PromptPlus.slnx
README.md		README.md
README.txt		README.txt
SECURITY.md		SECURITY.md
adr-config.adrplus		adr-config.adrplus
icon.png		icon.png

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PromptPlus

Highlights

What's new in the latest version

📢 Release Note – PromptPlus V.6.X Beta

🚀 Beta Phase Launch

🛠️ Source Code

📦 NuGet Package

💬 Community Feedback

Installation

Quick Start

Two-Layer Configuration

Layer 1 — Global defaults (applied to all controls)

Layer 2 — Per-control override (`.Options()` fluent method)

Persist config to disk

Global Behaviors

Localization

Adding a custom locale

Controls Reference

Widgets Reference

ConsolePlus Integration

Why two products?

How they fit together

The `PromptPlus` entry point

Samples

Documentation

Architecture Decision Records (ADR)

Code of Conduct

Contributing

License

About

Releases

Used by

Contributors

Languages

Folders and files

Latest commit

History

Repository files navigation

PromptPlus

Highlights

What's new in the latest version

📢 Release Note – PromptPlus V.6.X Beta

🚀 Beta Phase Launch

🛠️ Source Code

📦 NuGet Package

💬 Community Feedback

Installation

Quick Start

Two-Layer Configuration

Layer 1 — Global defaults (applied to all controls)

Layer 2 — Per-control override (.Options() fluent method)

Persist config to disk

Global Behaviors

Localization

Adding a custom locale

Controls Reference

Widgets Reference

ConsolePlus Integration

Why two products?

How they fit together

The PromptPlus entry point

Samples

Documentation

Architecture Decision Records (ADR)

Code of Conduct

Contributing

License

About

Topics

Resources

Code of conduct

Contributing

Security policy

Stars

Watchers

Forks

Releases

Used by

Contributors

Languages

Layer 2 — Per-control override (`.Options()` fluent method)

The `PromptPlus` entry point