Question

I would like to write a Console class that can output coloured text to the console.

So I can do something like (basically a wrapper for printf):

Console::Print( "This is a non-coloured message\n" );
Console::Warning( "This is a YELLOW warning message\n" );
Console::Error( "This is a RED error message\n" );

How would I print different coloured text to the Windows Console?

Answer 1

Check out this guide. I would make a custom manipulator so I could do something like:

std::cout << "standard text" << setcolour(red) << "red text" << std::endl;

Here‘s a small guide on how to implement your own manipulator.

A quick code example:

#include <iostream>
#include <windows.h>
#include <iomanip>

using namespace std;

enum colour { DARKBLUE = 1, DARKGREEN, DARKTEAL, DARKRED, DARKPINK, DARKYELLOW, GRAY, DARKGRAY, BLUE, GREEN, TEAL, RED, PINK, YELLOW, WHITE };

struct setcolour
{
   colour _c;
   HANDLE _console_handle;


       setcolour(colour c, HANDLE console_handle)
           : _c(c), _console_handle(0)
       { 
           _console_handle = console_handle;
       }
};

// We could use a template here, making it more generic. Wide streams won't
// work with this version.
basic_ostream<char> &operator<<(basic_ostream<char> &s, const setcolour &ref)
{
    SetConsoleTextAttribute(ref._console_handle, ref._c);
    return s;
}

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    HANDLE chandle = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE);
    cout << "standard text" << setcolour(RED, chandle) << " red text" << endl;

    cin.get();
}