tgt

A simple TUI for Telegram

About

[!NOTE]

tgt was created before the AI ​​era as a personal project to learn Rust.

tgt is a terminal user interface for Telegram, written in Rust.

Usage

From crates.io

cargo install tgt

From source downloading the tdlib

cargo build --release --features download-tdlib

After the installation, you can run tgt with the following command:

tgt --help

Features

Build features can be combined (e.g. cargo build --release --features download-tdlib,chafa-dyn).

Feature	Description
default	Enables download-tdlib and voice-message.
download-tdlib	Download and use TDLib automatically (recommended for most users).
local-tdlib	Use TDLib from path in LOCAL_TDLIB_PATH.
pkg-config	Find TDLib via pkg-config.
static	Statically link tdjson (use with download-tdlib or local-tdlib). No runtime tdjson dependency needed.
voice-message	Play Telegram voice notes (OGG Opus) and other audio (e.g. MP3). Requires CMake to build the Opus dependency. Enabled by default; use --no-default-features and then add back only the features you need (e.g. --features download-tdlib) to disable voice.
chafa-dyn	Enable chafa-based image rendering in the photo viewer (dynamic linking). Requires the chafa library installed on the system. Not supported on Windows ARM.
chafa-static	Same as chafa-dyn but links chafa statically. Not supported on Windows ARM.

Voice messages
If you build with the default features (or with voice-message enabled), you must have CMake installed so the Opus library can be built. Other audio formats (e.g. MP3) use rodio only; only Telegram voice notes (Opus) need this. If you build with --no-default-features and do not enable voice-message, voice playback is disabled and the app will show a message when you try to play a voice note.

Installation methods for CMake (when using voice-message)

• macOS — Homebrew: brew install cmake
• Linux — use your package manager, e.g. sudo apt install cmake (Debian/Ubuntu), sudo dnf install cmake (Fedora), sudo pacman -S cmake (Arch)
• Windows — CMake installer or e.g. winget install Kitware.CMake

Chafa (image rendering)
The chafa-dyn and chafa-static features use the chafa library to display images in the terminal. You must have chafa installed to use these features.

Installation methods for chafa

• Linux (Debian/Ubuntu/Kali, Fedora, Arch, openSUSE, etc.) — use your package manager:
  • sudo apt install chafa (Debian/Ubuntu/Kali)
  • sudo dnf install chafa (Fedora)
  • sudo pacman -S chafa (Arch Linux)
  • sudo zypper in chafa (openSUSE)
  • sudo emerge media-gfx/chafa (Gentoo)
• macOS — Homebrew or MacPorts:
  • brew install chafa
  • sudo port install chafa
• Windows — Scoop or Windows Package Manager (winget):
  • scoop install chafa
  • winget install hpjansson.Chafa

Arch Linux

Thanks to x-leehe for creating the AUR package. You can install tgt from the AUR:

yay -S tgt-client-git

NixOS

From flake.nix

Config directories are created automatically on first run, or you can generate initial config with tgt init-config (see CONFIG.md). Then you have two installation options:

1. Run directly with nix run:

nix run github:FedericoBruzzone/tgt

1. Add tgt to your system packages:

Add the following to your flake.nix:

{
  inputs = {
    nixpkgs.url = "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/nixos-unstable"
    tgt.url = "github:FedericoBruzzone/tgt";
    tgt.inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
  };

  outputs = { nixpkgs, tgt, ... }: { /* ... */ }
}

Then add it to your environment.systemPackages:

{pkgs, tgt, ...}: {
  environment = {
    systemPackages = [
        (tgt.packages.${pkgs.system}.default)
    ];
  };
}

To use a specific version of the program, override the src attribute:

{pkgs, tgt, ...}: {
  environment = {
    systemPackages = [
      (tgt.packages.${pkgs.system}.default.overrideAttrs (old: {
        src = pkgs.fetchFromGitHub {
          owner = old.src.owner;
          repo = old.src.repo;
          rev = "00000000000000000000000000000000000000";
          sha256 = "sha256-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=";
        };
        cargoHash = "sha256-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=";
      }))
    ];
  };
}

Docker build

• The Docker image is built using rust:1.91-trixie as the base.

• Run Docker image in interactive mode to open a bash shell. Specify a container name to reuse when required.

docker run -it --name  ghcr.io/FedericoBruzzone/tgt:

• Run tgt command from bash shell.

tgt

• for reusing the same container for next boot cycles, start the container

docker container start 

• run tgt by opening interactive shell from the container

docker exec -it  bash

Configuration

tgt is fully customizable. Config uses XDG-style paths (e.g. ~/.config/tgt on Linux) with backwards compatibility for the legacy ~/.tgt folder. The app creates config directories at startup if missing, and bundles default configs so it works out of the box after cargo install. Configs are versioned and the program adds missing keybindings on upgrade. Use tgt init-config to generate initial config files and tgt clear --config (or --data / --logs / --all) to remove them for a fresh start.

For config locations, versioning, CLI commands, keybindings, and per-file details, see CONFIG.md.

Contributing

Contributions to this project are welcome! If you have any suggestions, improvements, or bug fixes, feel free to submit a pull request. For more information, do not hesitate to contact us (see the Contact section).

Build instructions

There are three ways to build tgt:

1. Using the download-tdlib feature of tdlib-rs you do not need to set any environment variable. Then you can compile tgt using cargo build --features download-tdlib.
2. By default, tgt assumes that you have the tdlib built and the LOCAL_TDLIB_PATH environment variable set to the path of the tdlib directory. You can set the environment variable with the following command: export LOCAL_TDLIB_PATH="/path/to/tdlib". Then you can compile tgt using cargo build or cargo build --feature default.
3. You can use pkg-config to find the path of the library. In this case see the CONTRIBUTING.md file for more information. Then you can compile tgt using cargo build --features pkg-config.

You can also add static to statically link tdjson, so the final binary does not require tdjson installed at runtime (e.g. cargo build --features download-tdlib,static).

The CONTRIBUTING.md file contains information for building tgt and the steps to configure the tdlib in your local environment, starting from the compilation to the configuration of the environment variables.

Road Map

You can find the road map of the project here (in the pinned issues).

Commands

You can use make or cargo, as build tools. If you want to use cargo, please make sure to read the the Makefile to understand the flags used for each command. Here are the available commands:

make COMMAND

COMMAND:
  all            # Run fmt, clippy and test
  build          # Build the project
  run            # Run the project
  test           # Run the tests
  clippy         # Run clippy
  fmt            # Run rustfmt
  clean          # Clean the project

License

This repository is licensed under either of

• Apache License, Version 2.0 (LICENSE-APACHE or http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)

• MIT license (LICENSE-MIT or http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

at your option.

Please review the license file provided in the repository for more information regarding the terms and conditions of the license.

Contact

If you have any questions, suggestions, or feedback, do not hesitate to contact me.

Maintainers:

• FedericoBruzzone
• longelas
• Andreal2000