Paste terminal output — and Markdown / AI answers — into email, Slack, and docs as clean text. No screenshots, no triple-backtick code blocks.
What your terminal emits:
\e[2K\rDownloading [####------] 40%\e[2K\rDownloading [##########] 100%
\e[32m✔\e[0m build succeeded
master \e]8;;https://ci.example.com/42\aview run\e]8;;\a
What some-command | socb gives you:
Downloading [##########] 100%
✔ build succeeded
master view run (https://ci.example.com/42)
▶ Try it live in your browser — paste your own terminal, Salesforce CLI, or AI output and watch it clean up. Runs 100% client-side; nothing you paste leaves your machine.
Raw terminal output is full of stuff that turns to garbage the moment it leaves the terminal: ANSI color codes, progress bars that redrew themselves 200 times, spinner frames, Nerd Font icons that show up as □, and box-drawing tables that fall apart in a proportional font. socb cleans all of it and gives you plain, readable text.
Stripping colors is the easy 10%. socb also does the parts other tools skip:
- Collapses progress bars & spinners to their final frame (CR / backspace / erase-line redraws), and flattens multi-line redraws like docker/cargo/pip with
--emulate. - Flattens Markdown & HTML to readable prose —
#headings,**bold**, inline`code`, lists,[text](url)→text (url)— while keeping fenced code verbatim. Opt-in (--email/--plain,-m,--html). - Rebuilds box-drawing & Markdown tables into clean aligned columns, and drops Nerd Font / Powerline glyphs that render as tofu.
- Strips every escape sequence
strip-ansileaks (OSC, DCS/APC, sixel/Kitty) and rewrites OSC 8 hyperlinks totext (url)instead of dropping the URL. - Tidies PowerShell errors & shell prompts, reflows hard wraps, normalizes smart quotes/dashes to ASCII, and decodes UTF-16 / BOM input (no Windows mojibake).
- Optionally redacts secrets/PII before you share output up the chain (
--redact).
Zero runtime dependencies on the default path. Works on Windows, macOS, and Linux.
npm install -g sickofcodeblocks # commands: sickofcodeblocks and socb
# or run without installing:
npx sickofcodeblocks --help--emulate needs one optional package:
npm install -g @xterm/headlesssome-command | socb # clean a pipe
some-command 2>&1 | socb # include stderr
socb messy.log # clean a file
socb --clip # read clipboard, clean, write it back
socb --clip --redact # ...and mask secrets first
docker ps | socb --table ascii # tables as +--+ instead of aligned columns
pytest 2>&1 | socb --plain > clean.txtReal workflows, with the exact command:
| You want to… | Run |
|---|---|
| Share a failing build in Teams or Slack | npm test 2>&1 | socb --teams |
Tidy an sf/sfdx deploy error for Teams |
sf project deploy start 2>&1 | socb --teams |
| Email an AI answer or README as plain prose | copy it, then socb --clip --email |
| Clean a log file for a gist / bug report | socb build.log --plain > clean.txt |
| Auto-clean every copy (incl. Markdown) | socb --watch |
| Auto-clean copies for Teams / Slack | socb --watch --teams |
| Scrub secrets before sharing | socb --clip --redact |
| Tidy a pasted terminal session (prompts + wraps) | socb session.txt --email --prompts --reflow |
| Tidy a PowerShell error block | socb err.txt --ps |
| Feed clean output to an LLM / agent | some-cmd | socb --agent |
--clip reads the clipboard, cleans it, writes it back, and prints a one-line summary — then just paste. (-q/--quiet silences the summary.)
Don't want to run socb every time? Two ways to make it automatic:
1. Watch the clipboard. Run it once; every copy is cleaned and Markdown-flattened in place, ready to paste into Slack, Teams, email, or a Jira ticket:
socb --watch # clean + flatten every copy
socb --watch --teams # ...tuned for a Teams / Slack paste
socb --watch --email # ...flatten to prose for email / Docs / Jira
socb --watch --redact # ...and mask secrets tooWhile it runs in a terminal, live keys let you adjust without restarting:
[m] Markdown [r] redact [p] pause [s] skip next copy [u] undo [q] quit
Copy anything → it's sanitized the moment you copy it. Press q or Ctrl+C to stop. It's loop-safe (never re-processes its own output) and crash-proof (a bad copy is skipped, never fatal).
Want the old, conservative behavior — only rewrite copies that look like terminal output, leaving ordinary text and Markdown untouched? Add --only-messy. Want to watch it work without changing your clipboard? Add --dry-run.
2. Set persistent defaults so you never type a flag. Drop a ~/.socbrc.json (or a per-project ./.socbrc.json):
{ "redact": true, "tableMode": "strip" }Precedence: built-in defaults < config file < preset < command-line flags. With redact: true in your config, even socb --watch redacts automatically.
Start it on login (Windows). To have the watcher always running, register it with Task Scheduler once:
$action = New-ScheduledTaskAction -Execute "socb" -Argument "--watch"
$trigger = New-ScheduledTaskTrigger -AtLogOn
Register-ScheduledTask -TaskName "socb-watch" -Action $action -Trigger $trigger(macOS: a launchd agent; Linux: a systemd --user service or your DE's autostart.)
socb [options] [file]
<command> | socb [options]
socb --clip [options]
Input priority: [file] argument > --clip > piped stdin
| Flag | Short | Description |
|---|---|---|
--clip |
-c |
Read from the clipboard and write the result back to it |
--out <file> |
-o |
Write result to a file (default: stdout) |
--emulate |
-e |
Replay through a headless terminal — for multi-line redraws & TUIs |
--cols <n> / --rows <n> |
Emulator grid size (default 200 / 600) | |
--table <mode> |
-t |
reconstruct (default) · ascii · strip · keep |
--no-links |
Don't rewrite OSC 8 hyperlinks | |
--strip-emoji |
Remove emoji (+ ZWJ / variation selectors / skin tones) | |
--no-glyphs |
Keep Nerd Font / Private-Use glyphs | |
--no-fences |
Keep Markdown code fences + PowerShell ~ underlines (default strips them) |
|
--markdown |
-m |
Flatten Markdown to readable text (code kept verbatim); on in --email / --plain |
--no-markdown |
Keep Markdown markup literal (the default) | |
--html |
Strip HTML tags and decode entities (& → &) |
|
--prompts |
Strip leading shell prompts ($, PS C:\>, >>>) |
|
--reflow |
Rejoin hard-wrapped prose into flowing paragraphs | |
--powershell / --ps |
Tidy pasted PowerShell errors (~ underlines + + gutter) |
|
--no-typographic |
Keep smart quotes / em-dashes / ellipsis (don't convert to ASCII) | |
--arrows |
Also convert arrows (→ becomes ->) |
|
--expand-tabs / --tab-width <n> |
Convert tabs to spaces (default width 4) | |
--crlf |
Emit CRLF line endings (default LF) | |
--no-collapse-blanks |
Keep runs of blank lines | |
--redact |
-r |
Mask API keys, JWTs, emails, IPs, and home-dir paths |
--watch |
-w |
Keep cleaning the clipboard in place (Ctrl+C to stop) |
--interval <ms> |
--watch poll interval (default 800; 1500 on Windows) |
|
--slack / --teams / --email / --plain / --agent |
Presets (below) | |
--help / --version |
-h / -v |
Presets set a bundle of defaults; any explicit flag still overrides them (e.g. --email --no-markdown).
| Preset | Tables | Markdown | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
--slack / --teams |
reconstruct | left as-is | Slack & Teams render Unicode/emoji; paste tables inside a code block so columns align |
--email |
strip | flattened | Markdown → readable prose for proportional fonts (email / Docs / Word) |
--plain |
strip | flattened | The --email bundle + arrows + tabs→spaces. Maximum compatibility |
--agent |
strip | kept (structure) | Denoise for feeding output into a model: strips ANSI/box/glyph noise but keeps Markdown + Unicode (no flattening, no ASCII folding) |
--html, --prompts, --reflow, and --powershell are not bundled into the presets — each can alter ordinary prose (<generics>, a leading $, hard-wrapped paragraphs), so add them explicitly when your input needs them (e.g. socb --email --reflow).
Pasting a Claude / ChatGPT answer (or a README) into email drags along #, **, backticks, and ``` fences. --markdown (-m, and on by default in --email / --plain) flattens it to plain prose while keeping fenced code verbatim:
Input:
## Deploy
1. Run `npm ci`, then **build**.
2. See the [runbook](https://wiki/runbook).
```bash
export TOKEN=abc # keep me exactly
```socb --email:
Deploy
1. Run npm ci, then build.
2. See the runbook (https://wiki/runbook).
export TOKEN=abc # keep me exactly
It's opt-in, so a bare socb never mangles raw terminal output (where *, _, #, backticks are literal). --html does the same for HTML copied from a browser, Slack, or Teams.
By default socb rebuilds box-drawing tables (docker ps, kubectl get, gh pr list, …) into clean space-aligned columns. Aligned columns only line up in a monospace destination — for email / Google Docs / Word (proportional fonts) use --table strip or --email.
--redact is best-effort, not a security guarantee — always review the output before sharing. It masks AWS/GitHub/Slack/OpenAI keys, JWTs, Bearer tokens, key=value secrets, emails, IPv4 addresses (octet-validated), long hex tokens, and rewrites home-directory paths (C:\Users\you, /home/you) to ~.
PowerShell decodes and re-encodes the stream when you pipe between two native commands, which can convert carriage returns and mangle UTF-8 before socb ever sees the bytes. ANSI color stripping still works, but progress-bar collapse may not. To get byte-faithful input on PowerShell, prefer a file or the clipboard:
cmd /c "some-command > out.log 2>&1" # cmd redirection keeps raw bytes
socb out.log
# or, after selecting & copying terminal output:
socb --clip(cmd.exe and POSIX shells pipe bytes faithfully, so some-command | socb is fine there.)
socb ships an MCP server so Claude Desktop, Claude Code, and Codex can clean text or the user's clipboard on demand — and even start a clipboard watcher in a terminal — plus an experimental hook that denoises shell output before it reaches the model.
socb-mcp is a stdio MCP server exposing three tools:
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
sanitize_text(text, preset?, options?) |
Clean a string you pass in. |
clean_clipboard(preset?, options?) |
Read the user's clipboard, clean/flatten it, and write it back — paste-ready. |
start_clipboard_watcher(preset?, redact?, interval?) |
Open a terminal running socb --watch so every copy is auto-cleaned (best-effort; otherwise returns the command for the agent to run in a background terminal). |
So you can just ask your agent "clean what I just copied" or "start a clipboard watcher for Teams," and it calls the matching tool.
Claude Code — one command:
claude mcp add socb -- socb-mcpOr add to .mcp.json (project) / your user config by hand:
{ "mcpServers": { "socb": { "command": "socb-mcp" } } }Codex — add to ~/.codex/config.toml:
[mcp_servers.socb]
command = "socb-mcp"(If socb-mcp isn't on PATH, use npx -y sickofcodeblocks socb-mcp.) The server needs the optional @modelcontextprotocol/sdk dependency, which installs by default with the package — the plain CLI path stays dependency-free.
hooks/socb-clean.mjs is a Claude Code PreToolUse hook that rewrites noisy Bash commands (npm, pip, cargo, docker, pytest, …) to pipe their output through socb --agent, cutting ANSI / progress-bar tokens before they hit the model's context. It preserves the original exit code and falls back to raw output if socb is missing. Enable it in .claude/settings.json:
{
"hooks": {
"PreToolUse": [
{
"matcher": "Bash",
"hooks": [{ "type": "command", "command": "node /abs/path/to/hooks/socb-clean.mjs" }]
}
]
}
}It is conservative (only known-noisy tools; never multi-line / heredoc commands) and experimental — the MCP sanitize_text tool is the dependable path. On Windows it relies on the Bash tool running through git-bash (byte-faithful pipes); native PowerShell piping is not, so don't wire it to a PowerShell runner.
import { sanitize } from "sickofcodeblocks";
const clean = await sanitize(rawTerminalOutput, { tableMode: "strip", markdown: true, redact: true });Individual transforms (stripEscapes, resolveOverwrites, transformTables, flattenMarkdown, htmlToText, cleanPowerShell, stripPrompts, reflowParagraphs, redact, decodeInput, …) are exported too.
MIT