Plugins

Plugins are optional Python modules that extend or modify base VisiData's functionality. Once configured, plugins will be available upon every vd launching.

Known plugin homes

• saulpw's repo
• jsvine's repo
• anjakefala's repo
• ajkerrigan's repo
• ...and let us know about yours! Advice for making plugins.

How to use/activate a plugin

Manually

1. Make your plugin directory: mkdir -p ~/.visidata/plugins
2. Copy the plugin Python file there: cp myplugin.py ~/.visidata/plugins
3. Add a line to your ~/.visidatarc to import the plugin: import plugins.myplugin
4. Install the dependencies for the plugin.

For plugins that the VisiData core maintenance team curates, the dependencies can be found in the pydeps attribute in the plugins.json.

For example, the plugin vfake contains commands for creating columns with anonymised data.

To install it

1. Copy vfake/ from the repo to ~/.visidata/plugins.
2. Type pip3 install faker to install its dependency faker.
3. Add import plugins.vfake to ~/.visidatarc.

From within VisiData

We maintain a list of plugins which can be downloaded and installed from within the application itself. To incorporate a plugin into this list, add it to plugins.jsonl, and create a PR off of the develop branch.

To install a plugin, and its dependencies, from within VisiData:

1. Press Space, and then type open-plugins to open the PluginsSheet.

or

1. Launch the vdmen with vd on the commandline (do not provide a source). Press Enter on the row referencing the plugins sheet.
2. To download and install a plugin, move the cursor to its row and press a (add).
3. To uninstall a plugin, move the cursor to its row and press d (delete).

Adding a plugin performs all the manual steps above, automatically.

Removing a plugin will delete its import from ~/.visidata/plugins/__init__.py. It will not remove the plugin itself from ~/.visidata nor any of its dependencies.