ponysay

ponysay is a command‑line program that displays text inside an ASCII‑art pony, mirroring the behavior of the classic cowsay utility but using a variety of pony figures. Users invoke it with a message, optionally selecting a specific pony, and the program renders the message in a speech balloon beneath the chosen pony graphic. It supports terminal size detection via coreutils and requires Python 3, with optional texinfo for documentation generation.

The tool is packaged for many Unix‑like systems, including Linux distributions, macOS via Homebrew, and can be run in a Docker container. Installation scripts are provided, and the software can be configured to display only free‑licensed ponies or a broader set. Manuals are available in PDF, info, and man page formats, with translations in Spanish and Turkish.

Typical users are developers or terminal enthusiasts who want a whimsical way to display messages, fortunes, or script output. The program integrates with standard shell environments and can be added to shell startup files to show a pony‑styled fortune each time a terminal session begins.