How to Find Alternative CLI Tools for grep, cat, ps and More on altbox.dev

Updated

altbox.dev is a catalog of 134 alternative command-line tools for Linux, Unix, and macOS, organized so you can look up a standard utility and see what modern replacements exist for it. To find alternatives for a specific command like grep, cat, or ps, go to the site and locate that command in the "Alternative to" listing, then read the tool entries filed under it. Each entry tells you which standard command(s) the tool replaces and what language it's written in.

How the catalog is organized

The site is built around the standard Unix utilities it calls "alternative power tools." The main navigation dimensions are:

  • Alternative to — the standard command being replaced (e.g. cat, cd, curl, cut, df, diff, dig, du, find, free, ftp, git, grep, gzip, history, info, kill, locate, ls, man, nm, objdump, ping, ps, rm, scp, screen, sed, ssh, tail, tar, top, traceroute, tree, watch, wc)
  • Works with — the platform(s) the tool supports
  • Language — the implementation language (Perl, Rust, Go, C, etc.)
  • Recently added/updated — a feed of new and refreshed entries with dates

A single tool can appear under more than one "Alternative to" heading. For example, radare2 is listed as an alternative to both nm and objdump, and binwalk is also filed under both.

Step-by-step: finding a replacement for a specific command

  1. Identify the exact standard command you want to replace. The catalog is indexed by command name, so start from the utility itself — for instance grep, ps, or wc.
  2. Find that command in the "Alternative to" list. The site's own example: grep works fine for finding text, but tools like ack and ripgrep are designed for large trees of heterogeneous source code.
  3. Read the tool entries under that heading. Each entry gives a short description plus the language it's written in, so you can judge fit and ecosystem before installing anything.
  4. Check the "Recently added/updated" feed if you want current options. Entries carry update dates, so you can see what's actively maintained.

Worked examples from the catalog

The "Recently added/updated" section shows how entries map a tool to the command it replaces:

Tool Description Alternative to Language Updated
cloc Count blank, comment, and code lines across 400+ programming languages wc Perl 2026-05-09
scc Fast code counter with complexity analysis and COCOMO cost estimates wc Go 2026-05-09
tokei Count lines of code by language, quickly and accurately wc Rust 2026-05-09
flux Search, monitor, and kill processes with real-time resource tracking and port discovery ps Rust 2026-05-09
pspy Monitor Linux processes in real time without root permissions ps Go 2026-05-09
lz4 Extremely fast lossless compression prioritizing speed over ratio gzip C 2026-05-08
zstd Fast real-time compression with better ratios and speeds than gzip gzip C 2026-05-08
doggo Command-line DNS client with colorized tabular output; supports DoH, DoT, DoQ, DNSCrypt dig Go 2026-05-06
binwalk Firmware analysis tool for identifying and extracting embedded files in binary images nm, objdump Rust 2026-05-08
radare2 Libre reverse engineering framework and CLI toolset for analyzing, debugging, patching binaries nm, objdump C 2026-05-08

This table also shows why the "Language" column matters: if you want a Rust tool for line counting you'd look at tokei, while scc (Go) adds complexity analysis and cost estimates, and cloc (Perl) covers the widest language range.

What to check before switching

  • Multiple candidates for one command. wc alone has at least three alternatives in the recent feed, so compare descriptions rather than picking the first.
  • Overlapping replacements. Tools like binwalk and radare2 replace more than one command, which can simplify your toolchain.
  • Maintenance recency. The update dates let you favor tools that are still being worked on.
  • Language and platform. Use the Language column and the "Works with" dimension to confirm the tool fits your environment.

The catalog also links out to related reading, such as community threads on must-have terminal programs and articles on switching to modern CLI tools, if you want broader context beyond a single command.