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  title: 'TP: des boites en Unicode'
---

# Unicode boxes on a terminal

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Licence CC BY-NC-ND, Thierry Parmentelat

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Unicode comes with a few characters that can be used to draw squares or rectangles on the terminal

See e.g. this page for a list 

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Box-drawing_character>

**NOTE** these examples may look a little awkward on the notebook, but will look fine when run on a terminal, provided that it uses a fixed-width font, something that any decent terminal does

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## a first example

```{code-cell} ipython3
print ("wide box")
print ("\u250f\u2501\u2513")   # 3 odd characters
print ("\u2503 \u2503")        # 2 oddities + 1 space in the middle
print ("\u2517\u2501\u251b")   # 3 odd characters
```

for creating this example, all I had to do was to find the codepoint for each of the characters that I need, and insert them in a Python string using the '\unnnn' notation, where `nnnn` is the 4-digit hexadecimal codepoint.

```{code-cell} ipython3
# an example with one single character 
"\u250f"
```

## adding color

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optionnally, like we've seen for the evaluation, we can draw color on the terminal with the `colorama` library; note that it is useful mostly for Windows terminals (as other devices has standard ways to do color).

```{code-cell} ipython3
from colorama import Fore, Style
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
def red_text(text):
    return f"{Fore.RED}{text}{Style.RESET_ALL}"
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
"hello " + red_text("to the") + " world"
```

well here again, the output is awkward on the notebook, never mind...

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## putting it together

```{code-cell} ipython3
print ("thin box")
print ("\u250c\u2500\u2510")
print ("\u2502 \u2502")
print ("\u2514\u2500\u2518")
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
print ("wide connectable box")
print ("\u254b\u2501\u2513")
print ("\u2503 \u2523")
print ("\u2517\u2501\u251b")
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
# of course we could also do this
thin_box = """\u250f\u2501\u2513
\u2503 \u2503
\u2517\u2501\u251b"""
print(thin_box)
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
print(red_text(thin_box))
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
# or that
double_box = """\u2554\u2566\u2557
\u2560\u256c\u2563
\u255a\u2569\u255d"""
print(double_box)
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
print(red_text(double_box))
```

well, you get the picture..

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## assignment

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### v0

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We want to be able to write sentences like this

```{code-cell} ipython3
from boxes import Box0
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
b0 = Box0(8, 4)
print(b0.box())
```

### v1

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or even better: add style

```{code-cell} ipython3
from boxes import Box1
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
b11 = Box1(4, 3, style='thin')
print(b11.box())
```

and then color

```{code-cell} ipython3
b12 = Box1(10, 4, style='thin', color=Fore.BLUE)
print(b12.box())
```

### v2

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or better still

```{code-cell} ipython3
from boxes import Box2
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
b21 = Box2(4, 3, style='thin')
print(b21)
```

```{code-cell} ipython3
b22 = Box2(10, 4, color=Fore.BLUE, style='thin')
print(b22)
```

## assignment - if you're done

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a few suggestions about how to improve
* accept for the width and height: either an int (like before) or a **list of integers** 
  so we can build **grids** instead of boxes
  ```python
  b = Grid(10, [2, 2])
  ```
* make it reconnectable ? needs some thinking though ;-)
* etc...