podview

Browse files, view content, shell into, and tail logs for your Kubernetes pods — without leaving the terminal.

podview is an interactive TUI that replaces the repetitive kubectl exec workflow with vim-style navigation, real-time search, and type-ahead filtering across pods, directories, and files.

Features

• Context & namespace selector — switch clusters and namespaces from the home screen
• Pod list — / search, type-ahead filtering, status indicators, multi-container support
• Directory browser — starts in the container's working directory, with go-to path and filtering
• File viewer — line wrapping, / search with match highlighting, vim-style scrolling
• Interactive shell — Ctrl+S to drop into bash (or sh) inside any container
• Log viewer — streaming real-time logs (kubectl logs -f) with auto-tail, in-log search, log level coloring, word wrap, timestamp toggle, and pause/resume/clear controls
• Multi-pod log grid — select multiple pods with Space and view their logs side by side in a smart auto-sized grid; each panel has independent scroll, tail, and search; Tab to switch focus, Enter to zoom
• Activity indicators — green dot next to pods with recent log activity, updated every 3 seconds
• 5 color themes — Catppuccin Mocha, Dracula, Nord, Gruvbox Dark, Tokyo Night

Installation

Download binary

Grab the latest binary from Releases:

# macOS (Apple Silicon)
curl -L https://github.com/federivo/podview/releases/latest/download/podview-darwin-arm64 -o podview

# Linux (x64)
curl -L https://github.com/federivo/podview/releases/latest/download/podview-linux-x64 -o podview

# Linux (ARM64)
curl -L https://github.com/federivo/podview/releases/latest/download/podview-linux-arm64 -o podview

chmod +x podview
sudo mv podview /usr/local/bin/

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/federivo/podview.git
cd podview
bun install
bun run build
sudo mv podview /usr/local/bin/

Run directly with Bun

git clone https://github.com/federivo/podview.git
cd podview
bun install
bun run start

Prerequisites

• A valid ~/.kube/config (or KUBECONFIG environment variable)
• A Nerd Font for file icons (optional but recommended)
• Bun runtime (only if building from source or running directly)

Keyboard Shortcuts

Home Screen

Key	Action
j/k	Switch field
Enter	Open dropdown / Continue
Esc	Close dropdown
Ctrl+Q	Quit

Pod List

Key	Action
j/k	Navigate
PgDn/PgUp	Page navigation
/	Search pods (filters list)
Type	Quick filter (type-ahead)
Space	Mark/unmark pod for multi-pod log view
Enter	Select pod (open file explorer)
l	Open log viewer (single pod, or all marked pods)
Ctrl+S	Shell into pod
Ctrl+R	Refresh
Esc	Cancel search / Back to home
Ctrl+Q	Quit

Directory Browser

Key	Action
j/k	Navigate
PgDn/PgUp	Page navigation
Type	Filter entries
Enter	Open file/directory
Backspace	Parent directory
Ctrl+S	Shell into container
Ctrl+G	Go to path
Ctrl+R	Refresh
Esc	Back to pods
Ctrl+Q	Quit

File Viewer

Key	Action
j/k	Scroll
PgDn/PgUp	Page scroll
g	Go to top
Shift+G	Go to bottom
/	Search
n/N	Next/previous match
Esc	Clear search / Back to directory
Ctrl+Q	Quit

Log Viewer (single pod)

Key	Action
j/k	Scroll (pauses auto-tail)
PgDn/PgUp	Page scroll (pauses auto-tail)
g	Go to top
Shift+G	Go to bottom / resume auto-tail
/	Search within logs
n/N	Next/previous match
w	Toggle word wrap
t	Toggle RFC3339 timestamps
p	Pause/resume log stream
c	Clear log buffer (keeps stream alive)
Esc	Back to pod list
Ctrl+Q	Quit

Log Grid (multi-pod)

Key	Action
Tab	Focus next panel
Shift+Tab	Focus previous panel
j/k	Scroll focused panel
Enter	Zoom focused panel to fullscreen
Esc	Return to grid from zoom / Back to pod list
Ctrl+Q	Quit

Shell

Key	Action
Ctrl+]	Exit shell and return to TUI

Tech Stack

• Runtime — Bun
• UI — React + OpenTUI (terminal UI framework)
• Kubernetes — @kubernetes/client-node
• Language — TypeScript

Project Structure

src/
  index.tsx              Entry point, renderer setup
  App.tsx                View routing and state management
  theme.ts               Color theme definitions and context
  types/index.ts         TypeScript interfaces
  components/
    HomeScreen.tsx       Context/namespace/theme selection
    PodList.tsx          Pod listing with filter and multi-select
    FileExplorer.tsx     Directory browser
    FileViewer.tsx       File content viewer with search
    LogViewer.tsx        Single-pod streaming log viewer
    LogPanel.tsx         Individual log panel (used in grid)
    LogGrid.tsx          Multi-pod log grid with focus management
    Breadcrumb.tsx       Path navigation header
    SearchBar.tsx        In-file search input
    StatusBar.tsx        Help text footer
    Spinner.tsx          Loading animation
  hooks/
    usePods.ts           Pod fetching
    useFileSystem.ts     Directory listing state
    useFileContent.ts    File content state
    useTextSearch.ts     Search logic
    useLogStream.ts      Streaming log state with 50k line buffer
    usePodActivity.ts    Pod activity detection via K8s API polling
  services/
    kubernetes.ts        K8s client configuration
    podExec.ts           Command execution in pods
    fileOperations.ts    File/directory operations
    shellSession.ts      Interactive shell session
    launchShell.ts       Shell launch orchestration
  utils/
    logLevel.ts          Log level detection and color mapping

TLS Notice

By default, podview disables TLS certificate verification (NODE_TLS_REJECT_UNAUTHORIZED=0 in src/index.tsx). This is set to support clusters with self-signed certificates, which is common in development and internal environments. If your cluster uses valid TLS certificates and you want strict verification, remove that line from src/index.tsx.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Feel free to open issues or submit pull requests.

License

MIT