lsallcp

Recursively dump every file in a directory as colorized, fenced-code blocks -- with smart skip patterns, a live progress bar, and one-flag clipboard export. Built on cli-atelier, runs on Node.js.

npm install -g lsallcp

What it does

lsallcp walks a directory tree and prints every file it finds as a labeled, syntax-tagged code block:

src/index.ts:
<code>ts
console.log("hello")
</code>

It's built for quickly dumping a project's source into a chat window, a doc, or a clipboard -- for code review, LLM prompts, documentation, or debugging -- without manually opening and copy-pasting dozens of files.

Features

| Feature | Description | | ------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Recursive listing | Walks the full directory tree from any starting path | | Smart skip patterns | Skip by exact name, glob (*.png), or regex literal (/\.test\.ts$/i) | | True recursive pruning | A matched directory is never descended into -- not just filtered afterward | | Binary-safe | Detects binary files and shows a placeholder instead of dumping raw bytes | | Live progress bar | Real-time progress while files are read, powered by cli-atelier | | Colorized output | Paths, fences, and log messages are colored for readability | | Clipboard export | -c / --copy copies plain-text results directly to your system clipboard | | Zero runtime dependencies (besides cli-atelier) | Ships precompiled JavaScript -- no separate build step at install time | | Cross-platform | Works in Windows Terminal, Git Bash, macOS Terminal, and Linux shells |

Requirements

| Dependency | Minimum version | Notes | | ---------- | --------------- | ------------------------------------------------------- | | Node.js | >= 18.0.0 | Runs the compiled CLI directly, no other runtime needed |

lsallcp is a pure Node.js package. TypeScript sources are compiled to plain JavaScript with tsc and published under dist/, so no Bun, ts-node, or extra runtime is required to use it.

Installation

npm install -g lsallcp
# or
pnpm add -g lsallcp
# or
yarn global add lsallcp

To use it inside a single project instead of globally:

npm install -D lsallcp
npx lsallcp .

Usage

lsallcp <path> [skipPattern...] [--copy | -c]

| Argument | Required | Description | | -------------- | -------- | -------------------------------------------------------------- | | <path> | Yes | Directory to scan, e.g. ., ./src, ../my-project | | skipPattern | No | Zero or more names/globs/regexes to skip, recursively | | --copy, -c | No | Copy plain-text output to the clipboard instead of printing it |

Flags can appear anywhere after the path -- order doesn't matter.

Basic examples

# List every file in the current directory
lsallcp .

# Skip an exact folder name (matched at any depth)
lsallcp . node_modules

# Skip multiple exact names at once
lsallcp . node_modules dist .env

# Skip by glob pattern
lsallcp . *.png *.lock

# Skip by regex literal (wrap in slashes, flags optional)
lsallcp . /\.test\.ts$/i

# Combine skip types freely
lsallcp . node_modules *.png /\.spec\.ts$/

# Copy the result to your clipboard instead of printing it
lsallcp . --copy
lsallcp . node_modules -c

Skip patterns

Every skip argument is compiled into a matcher and checked against both the file/folder's basename and its relative path. A match on a directory prunes the entire subtree -- files inside are never even read.

| Pattern type | Syntax | Example | Matches | | ------------- | ------------------- | --------------------- | ---------------------------------------- | | Exact name | plain string | node_modules | Any file/folder named exactly this | | Glob | contains * or ? | *.png, **/dist/** | Shell-style wildcard match | | Regex literal | /pattern/flags | /\.test\.ts$/i | Full regular expression, flags supported |

Glob rules:

• * matches any characters except /
• ** matches any characters, including /
• ? matches exactly one character (not /)

.git is always skipped automatically, regardless of the patterns you pass.

Clipboard export

Passing -c or --copy copies the full, ANSI-free plain-text result directly to your system clipboard and suppresses the normal terminal printout -- you'll only see the scan log, progress bar, and a final confirmation:

lsallcp . node_modules --copy

ℹ Target: /Users/<nolly>/projects/my-app
ℹ Skip patterns: node_modules
ℹ Clipboard: enabled (content will not be printed)
✔ Found 214 file(s) after skipping
✔ All files read
✔ Listed 214 file(s) from /Users/<nolly>/projects/my-app
✔ Result copied to clipboard

Clipboard support is zero-dependency and platform-native:

| Platform | Tool used | | -------- | ------------------------------------------- | | Windows | clip (built-in, also works from Git Bash) | | macOS | pbcopy (built-in) | | Linux | wl-copy → xclip → xsel, first found |

If none of these tools are available on Linux, lsallcp prints a warning and leaves the terminal output untouched.

Output format

Each file is rendered as:

<relativePath>: <code><extension> <file content> </code>

• <relativePath> is colored cyan and bold, relative to the scanned root, using forward slashes on all platforms.
• <extension> is the file's extension without the leading dot (ts, json, md); extensionless files fall back to text.
• Binary files render as a dimmed, italic [binary file - content skipped] placeholder instead of raw bytes.
• Unreadable files (permissions, broken symlinks, etc.) render a red [unreadable: <reason>] placeholder instead of crashing the whole run.

Exit behavior

• Directory scanning never aborts on a single unreadable subdirectory -- it logs a warning and continues.
• If the target path doesn't exist or isn't a directory, lsallcp exits with an error and a non-zero status code.
• If no files remain after skip patterns are applied, lsallcp logs a warning and exits cleanly.

How it works

lsallcp is a thin, purpose-built CLI in three stages, written in TypeScript and compiled to JavaScript via tsc (npm run build, wired to prepare so it's built automatically on install from source):

1. Scan -- recursively walks the target directory (src/scanner.ts), pruning any path matched by a compiled skip matcher (src/matcher.ts) before ever entering it.
2. Read -- reads each remaining file, detects binary content (src/binary.ts), and formats it into a colorized fenced block (src/render.ts), updating a live progress bar as it goes.
3. Output -- either prints the assembled result to stdout, or strips ANSI codes and sends it to the system clipboard (src/clipboard.ts) when -c/--copy is set.

All terminal UI -- headers, spinners, progress bars, logs, boxes -- comes from cli-atelier, a zero-dependency, pure-ANSI terminal framework.

License

Released under the WTFPL License.