Actually there is a screenshot, but it is in the libsixel repository, because the README here is just the original Xorg one unaltered.
* https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel#x11-on-sixel-terminals
In X server implementation for SIXEL-featured terminals (2010-2014)saitoha
libsixel
C2016–2025
saitoha / libsixel
libsixel
A SIXEL encoder/decoder implementation derived from kmiya's sixel (https://github.com/saitoha/sixel).
36Distinct people
45Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
2.9KGitHub stars
What to know before exploring
What it is
A SIXEL encoder/decoder implementation derived from kmiya's sixel (https://github.com/saitoha/sixel).
GitHub
Where it is used
No documented product use was verified in the last source check.
What people are saying
No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.
No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.
Also in these discussions
- saitoha/ffmpeg-sixel · linked in 2 of the same discussions
Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.
This week on Hacker News
Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 1:49:46 PM UTC.
No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.
Mentions over time
HN mentions by year45 dated mentions
Observed mentions: 2016-03-07 14:41:17 UTC to 2025-09-23 07:54:10 UTC.
Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.
View mention counts and date ranges
| Period | Start (UTC) | End (exclusive, UTC) | Mentions | Submissions | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| 2017 | 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 9 | 1 | 8 |
| 2018 | 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| 2019 | 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| 2020 | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 5 | 2 | 3 |
| 2021 | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 4 | 1 | 3 |
| 2022 | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 5 | 1 | 4 |
| 2023 | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 8 | 0 | 8 |
| 2024 | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2025 | 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 3 | 0 | 3 |
From the project README
An excerpt from the repository, fetched Nov 13, 2026.
Read the project’s introduction
libsixel
What is this?
This package provides encoder/decoder implementation for DEC SIXEL graphics, and
some converter programs.
(https://youtu.be/0SasrQ7pnbA)
SIXEL is one of image formats for printer and terminal imaging introduced by
Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC).
Its data scheme is represented as a terminal-friendly escape sequence.
So if you want to view a SIXEL image file, all you have to do is "cat" it to your terminal.
On 80's real hardware terminals, it tooks unbearable long waiting times to display images.
But nowdays, with high-speed CPU and broadband network, we got the chance to develop a new scope of SIXELs.
SIXEL Animation
img2sixel(1) can decode GIF animation.
Related projects
Video streaming
Now Youtube video streaming is available over SIXEL protocol by FFmpeg-SIXEL project.
Above demo only uses 16 color registers.
SDL integration: Gaming, Virtualization, ...etc.
SDL1.2-SIXEL project makes enable you to operate various GUI applications on the terminal.
You can play "The Battle for Wesnoth" over SIXEL protocol.
You can run QEMU on SIXEL terminals.
SDL1.2-SIXEL can collaborate with XSDL-SIXEL.
Furthermore some information of SIXEL-ready SDL applications are reported.
NetSurf
(screenshot)
Green PDF Viewer
(screenshot)
DOOM
(tweet)
firesdl
(movie)
Langage Bindings
libsixel-python
converter.py example depends on it.
mruby-sixel
Used by mruby-webcam.
libsixel-p6
A perl6 bindings for libsixel
sixel-sys
Rust FFI bindings for libsixel
sixel-rs
A safe Rust wrapper for libsixel
id-sixel
Total Idris 2 bindings for libsixel
W3M integration
img2sixel(1) can be integrated with Debian's w3m(maintained by Tatsuya Kinoshita) that includes patches for -sixel option derived from Arakiken's w3m fork(remoteimg branch).
@uobikiemukot's sdump project selected another approach.
He wrote a w3mimgdisplay compatible program yaimg-sixel.
It also works with ranger.
X11 on SIXEL terminals
Xsixel is a kdrive server implementation for SIXEL terminals.
GNU Screen integration
Arakiken's GNU Screen fork(sixel branch)
works with SIXEL-supported applications including above products.
This project is now in progress.
GUI flavored SIXEL applications will integrated with existing terminal applications on it.
See also on youtube.
Twitter client integration
Some NetBSD/OpenBSD users are doing amazing challenges.
arakiken's mikutterm(mikutterm-sixel)
Now mikutter + mikutterm works with libsixel inline-image extension.
SIXEL works with old powerless machines such as
NetBSD/luna68k (here is OMRON LUNA-II):
NetBSD/hp300 (here is HP9000/425e):
arakiken's tw(tw-sixel)
arakiken's tw(tw-sixel) works with libsixel inline-image extension.
SIXEL works with old powerless machines such as OpenBSD/luna88k (here is OMRON LUNA-88K2 MC88100@33MHz):
sayaka-chan
sayaka-chan(PHP version) works with libsixel inline-image extension.
SIXEL works with old powerless machines such as NetBSD/x68k (here is SHARP X68030 with 060turbo):
SIXEL works even in-kernel console. @isaki68k wrote
a patch for ite(4).
Other
sixelSPAD
screenshot
Includes 2 commands fricas2sixel
and latex2sixel.
Neofetch
Now sixel backend is implemented.
See https://github.com/dylanaraps/neofetch/wiki/Image-Backends#sixel
termplay
Depends on sixel-sys, --converter=sixel option is supported.
sixelPreviewer
Simple scripts and development environment for realtime edit-previewing for dot, svg, markdown, ...etc.
sdump
A sixel image dumper, provides pdf previewer.
RetroArch
SIXEL video driver is provided if you build it with --enable-sixel option.
(screenshot)
Highlighted features
Improved compression
Former sixel encoders(such as ppmtosixel) are mainly designed for dot-matrix printers.
They minimize the amount of printer-head movement distance.
But nowadays this method did not represent the best performance for displaying sixel data on terminal emulators.
SIXEL data for terminals were found in 80's Usenet, but the technology of how to create them seems to be lost.
kmiya's sixel introduces the encoding method which is re-designed
for terminal emulators to optimize the overhead of transporting SIXEL with keeping compatibility with former SIXEL terminal.
Now libsixel and ImageMagick's sixel coder follow it.
@arakiken, known as the maintainer of mlterm, describes about the way to generate high quality SIXEL, which is adopted by libsixel
(http://mlterm.sourceforge.net/libsixel.pdf, in Japanese).
High quality quantization
img2sixel(1) supports color image quantization. It works well even if few number of colors are allowed.
Terminal requirements
If you want to view a SIXEL image, you have to get a terminal which support sixel graphics.
Now SIXEL feature is supported by the following terminals.
DEC VT series, VT240/VT241/VT330/VT340/VT282/VT284/VT286/VT382
DECterm(dxterm)
Kermit
ZSTEM 340
WRQ Reflection
RLogin (Japanese terminal emulator)
http://nanno.dip.jp/softlib/man/rlogin/
mlterm
http://mlterm.sourceforge.net/
Works on each of X, WIN32 GDI, framebuffer, Android, Cocoa version.
XTerm (compiled with --enable-sixel-graphics option)
http://invisible-island.net/xterm/
You should launch xterm with "-ti vt340" option.
The SIXEL palette is limited to a maximum of 16 colors.
To avoid this limitation, Try
$ echo "XTerm*decTerminalID: vt340" >> $HOME/.Xresources
$ echo "XTerm*numColorRegisters: 256" >> $HOME/.Xresources
$ xrdb $HOME/.Xresources
$ xterm
or
$ xterm -xrm "XTerm*decTerminalID: vt340" -xrm "XTerm*numColorRegisters: 256"
yaft
https://github.com/uobikiemukot/yaft
recterm (ttyrec to GIF converter)
https://github.com/uobikiemukot/recterm
seq2gif (ttyrec to GIF converter)
https://github.com/saitoha/seq2gif
Mintty (>= 2.6.0)
https://mintty.github.io/
cancer
https://github.com/meh/cancer/
MacTerm
https://github.com/kmgrant/macterm
wezterm
https://github.com/wez/wezterm
aminal
https://github.com/liamg/aminal
iTerm2 (>= 3.0.0)
https://gitlab.com/gnachman/iterm2
st-sixel
https://github.com/galatolofederico/st-sixel
Read the full README on GitHubWhat Hacker News says
45 sourcessaitoha/libsixel looks alive and kicking to me
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel/commits/master/
the x server (OP link) is inactive indeed
In X server implementation for SIXEL-featured terminals (2010-2014)How about this then: https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
In Show HN: Term.everything – Run any GUI app in the terminalSame with Linux:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_framebuffer
XTerm can as well, if built with Sixel support:
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixel
In Gnu/Hurd strikes back: How to use the legendary OS in a (somewhat) practical way> I'm sure young me would have found a ton of use cases for this, but now I'm old.
Invert the problem: get one and try to hack to do whatever. That may help you regain some teen spirit :)
It may be better if you found some ideas naturally (chasing a rabbit down its rabbit hole is fun, but chasing your own rabbit is even funnier)
However, if you want ideas, here are some simple ones:
- listen to your bluetooth devices like toothbrushes, scales, thermometers: try to decode and display what they send. There are many free software projects doing just that for Xiaomi devices
- connect a 4G module and try to send SMS. Most 4G modules can be driven with just AT commands so it shouldn't be too hard. The Quectel EC25 is extensively documented thanks to being present in the PinePhone: https://github.com/the-modem-distro/pinephone_modem_sdk/blob...
Read the rest
- then try to add a GPS antenna to make a field GPS: check https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PinePhone_Pro#GPS_/_GNSS
- then try to have a LTE data connection, using w3m with its sixel mode to visit google news https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel#w3m-integration
- try to integrate SMS, twitter etc within one client (twitter example: https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel#twitter-client-integrati... ) to post your GPS coordinates to your friends
- one everything works, increase the difficulty: flash a free firmware on the Quectel, and try to improve it, or add functions that would help your other projects, for example A-GPS to get a faster lock: https://github.com/the-modem-distro/pinephone_modem_sdk/tree...
Each one of this project should take at most one day, and may give you ideas to do more!
If you need help, get in touch, my email is in my profile.
Library you can use to generate these images:
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
Plenty of links to other projects.
In VT330/VT340 Sixel Graphicsiterm2/wezterm/etc will display images.
https://iterm2.com/documentation-images.html
there is also sixel. https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
In UnicodePlotsSixels is a paletted bitmap format, and (AFAIK) some terminals support more than 256 colors (e.g. see the screenshot in the readme here: https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel). But I guess the Wikipedia logo looks just fine with 256 colors.
In Sixel: A terminal bitmap graphics format from the 80sSixels are pixels and enjoy a wide support due to how old this VT240 format is.
The Kitty protocol starts with multiple formats:
>> The terminal emulator must understand pixel data in three formats, 24-bit RGB, 32-bit RGBA and PNG.
Different tools for different needs, but if you are going for a wide support you want something simple that doesn't also have 5 different types you have to separately implement and test:
>> d: Direct (the data is transmitted within the escape code itself)
>> f: A simple file (regular files only, not named pipes or similar)
>> t: A temporary file, the terminal emulator will delete the file after reading the pixel data. For security reasons the terminal emulator should only delete the file if it is in a known temporary directory, such as /tmp, /dev/shm, TMPDIR env var if present and any platform specific temporar
Read the rest
y directories and the file has the string tty-graphics-protocol in its full file path.
>> s: A shared memory object, which on POSIX systems is a POSIX shared memory object and on Windows is a Named shared memory object. The terminal emulator must read the data from the memory object and then unlink and close it on POSIX and just close it on Windows.
> What nonsense, it takes literally 15 lines of code without using anything beyond the standard library to write a client
Conveniently taking a preencoded PNG and assuming away the necessary queries of supported protocol:
>> Since a client has no a-priori knowledge of whether it shares a filesystem/shared memory with the terminal emulator, it can send an id with the control data, using the i key (which can be an arbitrary positive integer up to 4294967295, it must not be zero).
> I challenge you to match that for sixel
Challenge accepted. There are many libraries for many languages. Let's look at this one in perl:
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel/tree/master/perl
use Image::LibSIXEL;
$encoder = Image::LibSIXEL::Encoder->new();
$encoder->setopt("w", 400);
$encoder->setopt("p", 16);
$encoder->encode("images/egret.jpg");
and some print($encoder) to print the output, and this works on all the terminals listed on https://www.arewesixelyet.com/
Compared to kitty: "As of April 2022, kitty and WezTerm are the only terminal emulators to support this graphics protocol completely, with Konsole and wayst having partial support"
There are many nice things about the kitty protocol, but I think it's ultimately too complicated for the task. It's a Homer Mobile: https://www.wired.com/2014/07/homer-simpson-car/
If we want graphics in the terminal, first we need graphics in the terminal (using sixels is the simplest way, and you get access to many tools) then you can do more if you still want to - but you're likely to realize by then that all the extra things Kitty supports is YAGNI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_aren%27t_gonna_need_it?use...
Super neat. If you want to go even deeper down the terminal graphics rabbit hole you should look into adding sixel support.
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
In Forking Chrome to render in a terminalAlso:
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
contains img2sixel, which lets you dump images to the terminal. It can also do animated GIFs.
Video:
https://github.com/saitoha/FFmpeg-SIXEL
GUI apps:
https://github.com/saitoha/SDL1.2-SIXEL
and more, linked from the libsixel repository.
In A command line tool that draw plots on the terminalNot sure of Terminal emulator capabilities on Apple devices, but thanks to the Sixel standard [1] and a recent implementation in the form of libsixel [2], several applications, including emacs very much support image output in terminals.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixel
[2] https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
In Emacs on an iPadMany terminals can do this, see a list based on SIXEL support:
https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel#terminal-requirements
This list is not complete, KDE konsole supports this too (and other formats) for example.
In Building the Future of the Command LineSeems like sixel would be an excellent solution, thanks very much for that pointer.
However, I can always convert PDFs to images and go forward from there, I guess. It's not a bad workaround. The fbi image viewer is available for NetBSD's X Window system; not sure about the framebuffer port. https://www.kraxel.org/blog/linux/fbida/
EDIT: Apparently, NetBSD has lsix: https://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/pkgsrc/current/pkgsrc/graphics/ls...
"Like ls, but for images. Shows thumbnails in terminal using sixel graphics. /.../ Because lsix uses ImageMagick pretty much any image format will be supported.
However, some may be slow to render (like PDF), so lsix doesn't show them
unless you ask specifically."
On Linux, the green pdf reader for Linux apparently supports sixel: https://github.com/schandinat/green
Screenshot of green+sixel on NixOS: https://tedd
Read the rest
it.net/r/commandline/comments/4oldf5/view_pdfs_i...
Another Linux pdf reader with sixel: https://github.com/dsanson/termpdf
All in all, woah, lots of fascinating reading and links here -- since I was not much aware of sixel before: https://github.com/saitoha/libsixel
The sixel format itself seems to match really well with the NetBSD philosophy (among other things, keeping old hardware running via low-demanding, essentials-only software). Thanks again for that pointer.
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