mac-messages

Search through messages on a Mac using regular expressions.

Preparation

Set up a virtual environment

Using pyenv, for example:

pyenv virtualenv 3.8.9 mac-messages
pyenv local mac-messages

Create link to messages database

ln -s $HOME/Library/Messages/chat.db .

Install packages

pip install -r requirements.txt

Run from command line

./messages.py [pattern] [page] [page-size] [context-size]

All arguments are optional. The default pattern is "-" to search for all messages. Any other value is taken as a regular expression and used to filter messages. Results are paged. Page 1 is displayed by default, using a page size of 10. If a pattern is supplied other than "-", then messages surrounding matched messages may be displayed as well. Context messages are disabled by default using a context size of 0.

For example, to display the first 20 messages containing a word beginning or ending with "dog":

./messages.py '\w+dog|dog\w+' 1 20

To display the 3rd page of messages beginning with "Good", 100 per page, including up to 2 context messages before and after matching messages:

./messages.py ^good 3 100 2

Run Web server

./server-run.sh

In development mode, the FastAPI server will automatically reload when source files change. To run in development mode:

./server-run-dev.sh

Run in Docker container

1. Install Docker

2. Allow Docker to access ~/Library/Messages (Settings > Resources > File Sharing)

3. Build the image

   docker build -t mac-messages .

Run Web server in container

docker run -dp 8000:8000 -v $HOME/Library/Messages:/app/db mac-messages

Commands to examine and cleanup:

container() { docker ps | grep mac-messages | cut -d' ' -f 1; }
docker exec -it `container` bash
docker logs `container`
docker kill `container`
docker rmi -f mac-messages

Run from command line in container:

cmessages() { docker run --rm -v $HOME/Library/Messages:/app/db --env COLUMNS --entrypoint ./messages.py mac-messages $@; }
cmessages
cmessages 'dog\w+' 2 5 1