nerd-life

A tiny terminal toy that runs Conway's Game of Life with random per-run cell glyphs.

It can render with:

• Nerd Font icons (downloaded glyph list)
• block-style characters
• plain x

Features

• Auto-fits to your terminal size
• Adapts when you resize the terminal window
• Randomly picks a glyph each run cycle for visual variety
• Optional Nerd Font glyph mode with local cache at ~/.cache/nerd-life/
• Zero third-party Python dependencies

Requirements

• Python 3.14+
• uv
• A terminal that supports ANSI escape codes
• (Optional) a Nerd Font for best results with --icons nerd

Quick Start

uv run nerd_life.py

Stop anytime with Ctrl+C.

Usage

uv run nerd_life.py [--icons {nerd,blocks,plain}] [--refresh-icons] [--speed SECONDS] [--density 0.0-1.0] [--iterations N]

Options

• --icons: icon mode for alive cells (blocks default)
• --refresh-icons: re-download the Nerd Font glyph metadata cache
• --speed: seconds between frames (default: 0.08)
• --density: initial live-cell density from 0.0 to 1.0 (default: 0.3)
• --iterations: number of frames per cycle (default: 10000, use 0 for endless)

Examples

Run with block characters (default):

uv run nerd_life.py --icons blocks

Run forever with plain ASCII and slower updates:

uv run nerd_life.py --icons plain --iterations 0 --speed 0.12

Use Nerd Font icons and refresh glyph cache first:

uv run nerd_life.py --icons nerd --refresh-icons

Notes

• The grid wraps at edges (toroidal world).
• The app clears the screen and hides the cursor while running, then restores it on exit.

Roadmap Ideas

• Add a --seed flag for reproducible runs
• Add pattern presets (glider gun, pulsar, etc.)
• Package as an installable CLI (pipx install ...)

License

MIT