TUI Kanban Board

A simple, lightweight terminal-based kanban board built with Rust. Works on any Linux distribution.

Features

• Customizable columns: Create, rename, and delete columns to match your workflow (default: To Do, In Progress, Testing, Done)
• Multiple projects: Organize tasks across different projects with easy switching (Ctrl+P)
• Tag system: Categorize tasks with tags (urgent, bug, feature, and more)
• Color-coded tasks: Visual distinction based on tags
• Vim-style navigation: Use hjkl or arrow keys
• Task detail view: Edit titles, add/remove tags, write multi-line descriptions
• Bi-directional movement: Move tasks forward and backward through columns
• Persistent storage: Tasks are saved automatically to ~/.config/tui-kanban/projects.json
• CI/CD: Automated testing with GitHub Actions

Installation

From AUR (Arch-based distros)

# Using yay
yay -S tui-kanban-git

# Using paru
paru -S tui-kanban-git

# Manual with makepkg
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/tui-kanban-git.git
cd tui-kanban-git
makepkg -si

From Source

Requires Rust toolchain (rustc, cargo):

git clone https://github.com/xRipzch/TUI-Kanban.git
cd TUI-Kanban
cargo build --release
sudo install -Dm755 target/release/tui-kanban /usr/local/bin/tui-kanban

Usage

Run the application:

tui-kanban

Keyboard Shortcuts

Normal Mode

• h/j/k/l or Arrow keys - Navigate between columns and tasks
• Enter - Open task details
• a - Add a new task to the selected column
• t - Add a tag to the selected task
• m - Move task forward (TODO → IN PROGRESS → TESTING → DONE)
• n - Move task backward (DONE → TESTING → IN PROGRESS → TODO)
• d - Delete the selected task
• Shift+C - Add a new column
• Shift+R - Rename current column
• Shift+D - Delete current column (must be empty)
• Ctrl+P - Open project list
• ? - Show help
• q - Quit the application

Editing

In any field while you are editing.

• ctrl+e - Open external editor ($EDITOR)

Task Detail View

• Tab or j - Next field
• Shift+Tab or k - Previous field
• Enter - Edit focused field
• 1-9 - Remove tag by number (when Tags field is focused)
• Esc - Close task detail view

Editing Title/Description

• Enter - Save title / Add newline in description
• Esc - Save description / Cancel title edit
• Backspace - Delete character

Project List

• j/k or Arrow keys - Navigate projects
• Enter - Select project
• a - Add new project
• d - Delete project
• s - Set selected project as default
• Esc - Close project list

Tags

The following tags have special colors:

• urgent - Red (high priority)
• security - Light Red (security work)
• bug - Yellow (needs fixing)
• feature - Green (new feature)
• performance - Light Green (optimization)
• enhancement - Blue (improvement)
• User - Light Blue (user-facing work)
• Dev - Magenta (developer work)
• documentation - Cyan (documentation)
• design - Light Cyan (UI/UX work)
• refactor - Light Yellow (code quality)
• Other tags - White

Data Storage

Projects and tasks are automatically saved to:

~/.config/tui-kanban/projects.json

If you're migrating from an older version, your data will be automatically migrated from the old location.

Default Projects

TUI-Kanban supports setting a default project that opens automatically when you launch the application. There are two ways to set a default project:

Global Default (Recommended for most users)

Set a project as default globally using the project list (Ctrl+P):

1. Press Ctrl+P to open the project list
2. Navigate to your desired project using j/k or arrow keys
3. Press s to set it as the default project

Your choice is saved to ~/.config/tui-kanban/config.json and will apply everywhere.

Directory-Specific Default

For advanced workflows where you work on multiple projects in different directories, you can create a .tui-kanban-project file in any directory:

# In your project directory
echo "MyProject" > .tui-kanban-project

When you run tui-kanban from that directory, it will automatically open "MyProject".

Priority order:

1. Directory-specific .tui-kanban-project file (if present in current directory)
2. Global default from config.json (set via 's' in project list)
3. First project in the list (default behavior)

https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/fa467298-e3c5-4770-b4b5-c40280f6f9ab

Themes

TUI-Kanban supports multiple color themes to match your terminal preferences and improve readability. You can change the theme by editing your config file.

Available Themes

• high-contrast (Default) - Bright, bold colors for maximum visibility on any terminal theme
• classic - Traditional color scheme with improved contrast over the original
• solarized-dark - Popular Solarized palette designed for reduced eye strain
• gruvbox - Warm, retro color scheme with earthy tones
• nord - Cool, arctic-inspired colors from the Nord palette

Changing Your Theme

The theme can be changed from the UI by pressing ctrl+t.

Edit your configuration file at ~/.config/tui-kanban/config.json (Linux/macOS) or %APPDATA%\tui-kanban\config.json (Windows):

{
  "theme": "nord",
  "default_project": "Work"
}

Available theme names: high-contrast, classic, solarized-dark, gruvbox, nord

Changes take effect the next time you launch tui-kanban. If the theme name is invalid or not specified, it will default to high-contrast.

Contributors

Special thanks to:

• @mdetweil

• @papitz

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

Support

For bugs and feature requests, please create an issue on the GitHub repository.