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( Hello, I am Mootivator. )
( I print geek jokes in your shell and in )
( Claude Code, on startup or on demand with )
( the `moo` alias. )
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\
\ \__/
\ (oO)_________
\ (_.._) )\
\_ U ||---w-|| *
_|| _||
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A shell script that delivers random programming wisdom, jokes, and mantras in
the style of the classic Unix cowsay command—but with a cow that truly gets
programmers.
What is this?
Mootivator is a fun CLI standalone sh script that returns ASCII art of a cow sharing tech humor, coding wisdom, or developer-friendly sayings. Perfect for:
- Adding to your
.zshrcor.bashrcfor daily terminal inspiration - Spicing up your CI/CD pipelines
- Procrastinating productively
- Reminding yourself that all bugs are temporary
Samples
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( The future of software isn’t )
( no-code, it’s new-code. )
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\
\ \__/
\ (oO)_________
\ (_.._) )\
\_ U ||---w-|| *
_|| _||
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( Why do DevOps teams love containers? )
( Because they finally found something )
( that works the same in dev and prod. )
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\
\ \__/
\ (oO)_________
\ (_.._) )\
\_ U ||---w-|| *
_|| _||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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( QA found a bug in production. The )
( developer said, 'It works on my )
( machine.' QA shipped the developer's )
( machine to production. )
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\
\ \__/
\ (oO)_________
\ (_.._) )\
\_ U ||---w-|| *
_|| _||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Installation
- Download the sh script source to your home folder:
curl -fsSL https://github.com/tzador/mootivator/releases/download/v0.0.5/mootivator.sh -o ~/.mootivator.sh \ && chmod +x ~/.mootivator.sh
- Add the following to your
~/.bashrcor~/.zshrc(or any other) to run on every terminal startup:
# Mootivator ~/.mootivator.sh
You might also want to create a moo alias to trigger on demand, just add the
following to the same rc file.
alias moo="~/.mootivator.sh"
- Restart your terminal or bring a new one, and enjoy the humor!
Claude Code integration
You can have Mootivator greet you at the start of every
Claude Code session via a
SessionStart hook.
The script accepts a --claude flag, which runs Mootivator and wraps its
output in the JSON shape Claude Code expects (requires
jq):
sh ~/.mootivator.sh --claude # {"systemMessage":"\n ... cow output ... "}
To install it, add the hook to your ~/.claude/settings.json:
{
"hooks": {
"SessionStart": [
{
"hooks": [
{
"type": "command",
"command": "~/.mootivator.sh --claude"
}
]
}
]
}
}Start a new Claude Code session and the cow will moo at you.
Categories
The mootivator draws from 42 categories of programming culture, including:
- 🤓 Programming jokes and puns
- 💪 Motivational hacker wisdom
- 🧘 Zen of programming
- ☕ Coffee & code
- 🐛 Debugging mantras
- 🔧 DevOps quips
- 🎯 Language-specific humor (JavaScript, Python, C++, Java)
- 🔐 Security sayings
- 🌩️ Cloud comedy
- 🗄️ Database jokes
- 🔀 Git wit
- 📝 Documentation digs
- 🧪 Testing truths
- 📚 And many more!
All the prases have been generated using claude-sonnet-4-5, around 100 per
category, 4939 in total.
The prompt workflow included generating first, then rating, and keeping the best ones. Instructions of what makes a good humor has also been added to the context.
License
See LICENSE file for details.
Remember: There are no bugs, only undocumented features. Now go forth and code! 🐮