kuva

Kuva — CLI Scientific Plotting

27 chart types from stdin, CSV, or TSV. Output format is inferred from -o extension: .png, .svg, or .pdf.

Workflow — Always Show Plots

Every generated plot MUST be shown to the user. Never generate a plot and silently save it.

Save plots to /tmp by default. Never write plots to the current working directory unless the user explicitly requests it.

Single Plot

1. Run kuva ... -o /tmp/plot.png
2. Immediately call read /tmp/plot.png to show the user
3. If the plot looks wrong, regenerate with corrected parameters
4. Only proceed once the user has seen the output

Multiple Plots

When rendering several plots:

1. Generate all plots first (e.g., kuva ... -o /tmp/plot1.png, then kuva ... -o /tmp/plot2.png, etc.)
2. Then show them all together in a single batch using the read tool (e.g., read /tmp/plot1.png followed by read /tmp/plot2.png)
3. If any plot looks wrong, regenerate only that one, then re-show all plots again
4. Only proceed once the user has seen every output

Input Method — Always Use DuckDB Pipe

Always prefer DuckDB pipe over file input. Kuva reads CSV directly via positional argument, but DuckDB gives you ignore_errors=true for messy data, CAST/aggregations on the fly, and no intermediate files. When piping, do NOT pass a file argument to kuva (it will read the file instead of stdin).

duckdb :memory: -csv << 'EOF' 2>/dev/null | kuva bar --label-col Vendor --value-col cnt \
  --theme dark --color "#fad000" --background "#191033" \
  --title 'Vendor Counts' -o plot.png
SELECT Vendor, COUNT(*) AS cnt FROM read_csv('data.csv', header=true, ignore_errors=true) GROUP BY Vendor ORDER BY cnt DESC;
EOF

DuckDB Gotchas

• Columns with mixed empty strings and numeric values cause CAST failures. Filter non-numeric rows: WHERE col != '' AND col NOT LIKE '%—%'.
• Column names with spaces require double quotes: "Payment Method".
• Use heredoc (<< 'EOF' ... EOF) with duckdb for complex queries — -c struggles with quoting.
• Strip plot does NOT support pipe input (no stdin) — use file input for kuva strip only.
• Suppress DuckDB's resource warnings with 2>/dev/null so kuva receives clean CSV on stdin.

Quick Reference

See chart reference for full chart type table, parameter naming, and examples.

Coloring

Single-color charts: --color "#hex" sets all bars/elements to one color. Works on bar, histogram, box, violin, strip.

Strip plot caveat: Does NOT support --color-by — use --color for a single fill, or switch to kuva violin / kuva box with --color-by if per-group coloring is needed.

duckdb :memory: -csv << 'EOF' 2>/dev/null | kuva bar --label-col x --value-col y --color "#fad000" \
  --theme dark --background "#191033" -o plot.png
SELECT x, CAST(y AS DOUBLE) AS y FROM read_csv('data.csv', header=true, ignore_errors=true);
EOF

Multi-series charts: --color-by column + --palette name. Palette cycles per series. Not all chart types support --color-by — check --help. Available palettes: category10, wong, okabe-ito, pastel, bold, tol-bright, tol-muted, tol-light, ibm

Pie charts: use --palette (it overrides --color). No per-slice color control via CLI.

Custom background: --background "#191033" overrides the theme's canvas color.

No custom themes via CLI. Only 4 built-in: light, dark, solarized, minimal. Use these defaults:

kuva flag	Your palette value	Usage
--background	#191033 (base00)	Canvas background for all charts
--color	#fad000 (base0A/yellow)	Default bar/histogram fill color
--theme	dark	Dark theme as base

Example: kuva bar --label-col x --value-col y --theme dark --color "#fad000" --background "#191033" -o plot.png

Shared Styling Options

All chart types accept:

• --theme light|dark|solarized|minimal
• --palette category10|wong|okabe-ito|pastel|bold|tol-bright|tol-muted|tol-light|ibm
• --cvd-palette deuteranopia|protanopia|tritanopia (overrides --palette)
• --background <CSS> — canvas background color
• --x-label, --y-label, --ticks N, --no-grid, --log-x/y
• --interactive (SVG only), --width, --height, --scale, --title

Bar chart extras: --bar-width, --agg sum|mean|median|min|max, --count-by column

Constraints & Gotchas

• --color-by overrides --color; --count-by ignores --value-col
• --palette overrides --color on pie charts and multi-series charts
• --terminal is incompatible with -o file output
• Column names with spaces need quoting: --x "my column"
• Pie chart does not support --agg — must pre-aggregate via DuckDB (SUM, GROUP BY, etc.)
• Line chart requires numeric x-axis — convert dates in DuckDB (e.g., year*12+month)
• When piping from DuckDB, do NOT pass a file argument to kuva — it will read the file instead of stdin

Chart Types

27 chart types: scatter, line, bar, histogram, pie, box, violin, strip, density, ridgeline, heatmap, sankey, chord, upset, volcano, manhattan, forest, candlestick. Check kuva <chart> --help.

Full Examples

See chart examples for complete working examples for each chart type.