Wrong characters from "tree" command

Question

Level 1

84 points

Wrong characters from "tree" command

Using the standard "tree" command (as supplied by MacPorts), if at the Terminal prompt I cd to a folder and then execute "tree"there, I get output like this:

.
├── Activity\ Monitor.app
├── ApplicationsFolderIcon.icns
├── BBEdit.app
├── Backup
│   ├── Backup\ and\ Sync\ from\ Google.app
│   ├── Carbon\ Copy\ Cloner.app
│   ├── Dropbox.app\ 
│   ├── ForeverSave\ 2.app
│   ├── Get\ Backup\ Pro\ 3.app

However, if I redirect the output to a text file, as in

tree > myapps.txt

then I get wrong characters when I view the file in TextEdit:

.
‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ Activity\ Monitor.app
‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ ApplicationsFolderIcon.icns
‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ BBEdit.app
‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ Backup
‚îÇ¬†¬† ‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ Backup\ and\ Sync\ from\ Google.app
‚îÇ¬†¬† ‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ Carbon\ Copy\ Cloner.app
‚îÇ¬†¬† ‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ Dropbox.app\ 
‚îÇ¬†¬† ‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ ForeverSave\ 2.app
‚îÇ¬†¬† ‚îú‚îÄ‚îÄ Get\ Backup\ Pro\ 3.app

What's wrong?

iMac 27", macOS 10.15

Posted on Dec 10, 2019 9:33 AM

Reply

Answer 1

VikingOSX

Level 10

123,254 points

Dec 10, 2019 1:40 PM in response to murrayE

Using tree v1.8.0.

Reply

Answer 2

VikingOSX

Level 10

123,254 points

Dec 10, 2019 11:42 AM in response to murrayE

tree -n --charset utf-8 > myapps.txt

Strip the color information [-n] from the UTF-8 output. This removes all of those prefaced color codes in TextEdit. Also, since TextEdit is not a proper programmer's editor, it will not align the output as it would if piped into BBEdit or more -r .

Here is the result from the preceding command when opened in BBEdit 13:

and in TextEdit:

Reply

Wrong characters from "tree" command

Similar questions