Browsing log streams with fzf #

In order to allow changing queries and getting the updated results in real-time, fzf keeps the whole input list in memory and scans the list whenever the query changes.

So if you attach fzf to an endless input stream, such as server logs, the memory usage will grow indefinitely and fzf will eventually crash.

To work around this limitation, fzf provides --tail=NUM option that allows you to limit the number of items to keep in memory. When the number of items exceeds the limit, fzf will drop the oldest items from the list.

# Make sure fzf doesn't blow up
cat /dev/random | xxd | fzf --tail 1000 --tac

Best practices #

• Use --tac to see the newest items up front
• You might want to use --no-sort option to keep the order of the items intact
  • Without sorting, you’ll likely see many irrelevant matches, so try disabling fuzzy matching with --exact

Examples #

Browsing local logs files #

tail -f *.log | fzf --tail 100000 --tac --no-sort --exact

Browsing Kubernetes logs using stern #

stern . --color always 2>&1 |
    fzf --ansi --tail 100000 --tac --no-sort --exact \
        --bind 'ctrl-o:execute:vim -n <(kubectl logs {1})' \
        --bind 'enter:execute:kubectl exec -it {1} -- bash' \
        --header '╱ Enter (kubectl exec) ╱ CTRL-O (open log in vim) ╱'

--color always and --ansi #

stern allows you to see logs from multiple pods at once, each in a different color. But like most other programs, it suppresses color codes when the output is redirected to another program.

To preserve the colors, use --color always option, and make fzf recognize the ANSI color codes by specifying --ansi option.

--bind #

The above example uses --bind option to define two custom bindings.

• You can press ctrl-o to open the log in vim,
• and enter to execute kubectl exec on the selected pod.

execute action allows you to “execute” an arbitrary command without leaving fzf, so when you’re done, you can continue browsing the logs.

{1} in the bind expression denotes the first token of the current line, which is the name of the pod.