Upgrade your command line experience with Windows Terminal
Overview
If you have always wanted for an upgraded command line experience on Windows, you’re in for a treat! The Command Line experience on Windows 10 has received a boost, thanks to the Windows Terminal. Windows Terminal is a fast and powerful Terminal application available for users of command line tools. It works with PowerShell, Command Prompt and Windows Subsystem for Linux shells. It is an open-source project, including features requested by the Windows command-line community. Originally announced at Microsoft Build 2019, it is out of preview, and available to install on Windows 10 PCs.
Features
Windows Terminal can be used to run shells like Command Prompt, PowerShell, Azure Cloud Shell, and Windows Subsystem for Linux. It provides access to features like tabs, panes, themes and styling, custom configurations and more. Some features worth highlighting is:
- It supports GPU accelerated text rendering engine, providing access to fonts, use of UTF-8 characters, glyphs, emojis and more.
- Multiple panes can be opened simultaneously, hosting multiple instances of shells inside one tab, which is a huge multitasking improvement. Tabs allow you to keep different instances open for different tasks.
- One can create multiple profiles with unique set of customizations across various instances. Key bindings are also accessible, which can be customized for common actions ranging from copy-paste to more sophisticated ones like opening split panes and searching for text.
- The app supports setting the background opacity, aligning with the Fluent Design experience. To make it even better, one can apply image and gifs inside the terminal window.
- Command line arguments can be passed to the terminal at startup to complete certain tasks.
Installation
Windows Terminal can be installed from multiple sources:
- Microsoft Store
- GitHub
- Windows Package Manager(winget)
- Chocolatey Package Manager
The Microsoft Store version is the recommended version to get updates as they are made available. Using the other methods, each build needs to be installed manually.
To install from Microsoft Store, head over to the following link: Windows Terminal on Microsoft Store. To install the standalone builds from GitHub, head over to GitHub repository. Installing via Windows Package Manager requires running the following command: winget install –id=Microsoft.WindowsTerminal -e. To install through Chocolatey, the GitHub repo has instructions on how to achieve the same.
Custom command line
If you use PowerShell and/or Bash for your command-line requirements, you can give a makeover to the prompt with the help of tools like Oh my Posh and Terminal Icons. These tools help in styling the prompts with colors, emojis and glyphs. It makes the prompt more customizable and informative. To get these tools up and running, refer to the following Microsoft Docs tutorial.
Versioning
Windows Terminal comes in two versions, Preview and Stable. The Preview builds gain access to new features and fixes before stable branch to test new features and validate bug fixes. Both are available as different apps on the Microsoft Store. The stable version is the recommended version to get from the store, but to flight the preview builds, one needs to install the preview version separately from the store. The preview version carries a different icon for distinguishing and can be installed side by side with the stable version. The preview version gets various build updates for features, bug fixes and reliability, after which the update is released to the stable branch. Installing preview helps the team in testing and validation of new features, while nerds can also participate with the team in development of the terminal application.
As of authoring this article, the stable version sits at v1.3, and preview version is on v1.4.
Roadmap
The application always getting new features and enhancements for a better CLI experience on Windows 10. The team has decided upon a public roadmap to address issues and add relevant features for the version 2.0 of the terminal application. Numerous features are in consideration for development like a Settings UI, Command Palette for quick access to commands, Clickable links, Tab tear-off, administrator mode and many more. As they are being developed, the preview builds will get access to these features first. The roadmap is available Windows Terminal Roadmap.
Note: Curious to learn more about command-line, from its origins to the modern command-lines we use today? Head over to Windows Command-Line: Backgrounder.
Summary and closing
Windows Terminal is a brand new modern Productive terminal application for the users of command line. It is rich in feature and Microsoft has delivered the feedback the community was asking for. The team has optimized it to be fast and resource friendly, while delivering a huge upgrade to the command line experience on Windows 10. Traditionally, the Windows Console has existed on Windows. While the team added new features to it, backward compatibility was the reason Microsoft had to build a new separate app for the users. Windows Terminal is the successor of the traditional Windows Console(conhost.exe) on Windows. The team has put in a lot of work to make the app feature rich and remain compatible with all shells and run CLI applications the way we are already used to. So, what are you waiting for? Install the Windows Terminal on your PC and upgrade your CLI experience. You can also install the preview version and participate in the development process. The app is well documented and can be found here: Windows Terminal Documentation.
