pywc

Custom implementation for the Unix wc (word count) utility, written in Python.

Project

• Description: Custom Python reimplementation of the wc utility. Counts lines, words, bytes and multibyte characters from files or standard input.
• Author: Alexandru Prodan

Features

• Lines: -l — count newline characters.
• Words: -w — count words (split by whitespace after decoding).
• Bytes: -c — count raw bytes.
• Characters: -m — count characters after decoding according to locale.
• Default behavior: when no flags are provided the program prints lines, words and bytes (in that order).

Requirements

• Python: ^3.10 (see pyproject.toml).

Installation

• Using Poetry:

  poetry install

• Or with pip (editable install for development):

  pip install -e .

Usage

• Run against a file:

  python pywc/main.py [options] [path]

• Read from standard input (no path):

  cat data/test.txt | python pywc/main.py -w

• Options:

  • -l: number of lines
  • -w: number of words
  • -c: number of bytes
  • -m: number of characters (multibyte-aware, uses locale decoding)

• Output format:

  • When a file path is provided the program prints counts separated by tabs and appends the file path as the last column.
  • When reading from stdin (no path) the path column is omitted.

  Example (default behavior, no flags):

  python pywc/main.py data/test.txt

  Output format: LINES\tWORDS\tBYTES\t/path/to/data/test.txt

  Example (specific flags):

  python pywc/main.py -l -w data/test.txt

  Output format: LINES\tWORDS\t/path/to/data/test.txt

Running Tests

• Run the test suite with pytest:

  pytest -q

Repository layout

• pywc/ : package source (main implementation is pywc/main.py).
• tests/ : unit tests (uses pytest).
• data/ : example/test data files.

Contributing

• Contributions are welcome. Please open issues or pull requests. Follow standard GitHub workflow and keep changes focused and small.

License

• See the LICENSE file in the repository root.