I have a simple json file and if I pipe the output of "jq" into "less", the colors get removed.
This works:
# yey, lots of colors
jq "." /tmp/myfile.json
This doesn't work:
# ugly output :( , no colors
jq "." /tmp/myfile.json | less -R
Any ideas on how to make "less" keep the colors?
It is jq that is suppressing the colours. From the man page
o --color-output / -C and --monochrome-output / -M:
By default, jq outputs colored JSON if writing to a terminal.
You can force it to produce color even if writing to a pipe or a file
using -C, and disable color with -M
So, just use:
jq -C "." /tmp/myfile.json | less -R
and it will output colours regardless. The less command doesn't need the -R switch on my version, but I believe it does on older versions. If you see the ESC... codes, you will need that switch.