How do you output a QR code to the linux cli terminal for scanning?

Question

I want to be able to output a QR code to the ubuntu cli terminal where I can scan with my phone. I have a configuration file I want to convert to a QR code so I can scan it vs having to transfer it over a usb drive. Many of the google results only show you how to convert a file to a QR image file, but I want to output to the terminal itself.

Solution 1

Use the terminal application 'qrencode'. The command you are looking for is the following:

qrencode -t ansiutf8 < myfile_here

The t option is to specify output type. it can also be PNG for a file or ASCII as ascii format.

Solution 2

Passing an url inline:

qrencode -m 2 -t utf8 <<< "https://superuser.com/questions/1492624/how-do-you-output-a-qr-code-to-the-linux-cli-terminal-for-scanning/1492625"

---

To ease the use, with an alias:

alias qr='qrencode -m 2 -t utf8 <<< "$1"'

The first time:

. ~/.bashrc

Now, later on, possible usages:

qr https://superuser.com/questions/1492624/how-do-you-output-a-qr-code-to-the-linux-cli-terminal-for-scanning/1492625

qr "Hello world!"

qr $(cat file.txt)

.

Comments

[Hannu]

sudo apt install qrencode