Microsoft has released the Windows Terminal Preview version. The latest version of the Terminal app is available from the Microsoft Store.
As per Microsoft's devBlog -
Windows Terminal is a new, modern, fast, efficient, powerful, and productive terminal application for users of command-line tools and shells like Command Prompt, PowerShell, and WSL.
Read more about the detailed features on devblogs.microsoft.com
Let's get started.
Install Microsoft's new terminal in Windows
Make sure your machine meets the minimum requirements:
Download it from the Microsoft Store: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/windows-terminal-preview/9n0dx20hk701
Alternatively,
- Press windows+q
- Type Microsoft Store
- Goto search bar on the top right and search for - Windows terminal
Install and Launch.
Microsoft's new terminal features
On the first launch, the default terminal is PowerShell with the familiar old UI.
But wait.. the new terminal is packed with some serious features.
The most awaited feature is multiple tabs. The new terminal users now are able to open any number of tabs like Command Prompt, PowerShell, etc.
Microsoft now allows Windows Terminal to co-exist with Windows Console. If you haven't noticed yet, there is a small drop-down arrow icon in titlebar.
When clicking on this we can see the cmd option is available too. Apart from that, Terminal users can now connect to Azure Cloud Shell, which provides shell access to Azure.
These features make the new terminal more powerful, efficient and enhancing the productivity for the terminal users.
Awesome!
Customizing Microsoft's new terminal in Windows
Yes! We can further customize the new terminal's appearance as we want to.
Using Terminal’s configuration mechanism, you will be able to create multiple "profiles" for each shell/app/tool you want to use, whether it be PowerShell, Command Prompt, Ubuntu, or even SSH connections to Azure or IoT devices.
These profiles can have their own combination of font styles and sizes, color themes, background blur/transparency levels, etc. You can now create your own custom-styled Terminal that is personalized to your unique taste!
- Microsoft Developer Blogs
Let's customize our terminal.
Go to start menu and type "terminal" and open it.
The next step is to edit the settings in order to customize it. Press CTRL + ,
A new notepad editor will open having all the settings in JSON format. We are going to change these settings.
requestedTheme Sets the title bar background to black.
startingDirectory When the terminal is launched, it will open in the defined directory. I set this to Wamp folder so that I can navigate to desired project in it by typing cd project directory
backgroundImage The new terminal allows us to set a background image windows. Very cool.
useAcrylic & acrylicOpacity When set to true, the window will have an acrylic background and its opacity can be controlled using acrylic opacity.
We can customize the cursor UI, set window padding, font size, foreground color, etc. We can also bind the shortcut keys.
For example -
...
"keybindings":
[
{
"command" : "closeTab",
"keys" :
[
"ctrl+w"
]
},
{
"command" : "newTab",
"keys" :
[
"ctrl+t"
]
}
]
...Check out the Windows Terminal Documentation and the complete list of things we can do in Profiles.json.
Here are the custom settings I have implemented in the new terminal.
//To view the default settings, hold "alt" while clicking on the "Settings" button.
//For documentation on these settings, see: https: //aka.ms/terminal-documentation
{
"$schema": "https://aka.ms/terminal-profiles-schema",
"defaultProfile": "{61c54bbd-c2c6-5271-96e7-009a87ff44bf}",
"requestedTheme": "dark",
"showTerminalTitleInTitlebar": true,
"profiles": [
{
"name": "PowerShell",
"startingDirectory": "C:/wamp64/www",
//Make changes here to the powershell.exe profile
"guid": "{61c54cbd-c2c6-5221-96e7-0x9a87ff44bf}",
"backgroundImage": "/dark-batman.jpg",
"cursorShape": "vintage",
"acrylicOpacity": 0.75,
"useAcrylic": true,
"closeOnExit": true,
"cursorColor": "#00FF00",
"padding": "5, 5, 5, 5",
"commandline": "cmd.exe",
"acrylicOpacity": 0.85000002384185791,
"hidden": false
},
{
"name": "cmd",
"startingDirectory": "C:/wamp64/www",
//Make changes here to the cmd.exe profile
"guid": "{0cda0dad-31be-5f56-a8ff-oeceeeaa6101}",
"backgroundImage": "/dark-landscape.jpg",
"commandline": "powershell.exe",
"padding": "5, 5, 5, 5",
"hidden": false
},
{
"name": "Azure Cloud Shell",
"guid": "{b153ae62-4e33-3e58-b989-02998ec441b1}",
"hidden": false,
"source": "Windows.Terminal.Azure"
}
],
//Add any key binding overrides to this array.
//To unbind a default key binding, set the command to "unbound"
"keybindings": [
{
"command": "closeTab",
"keys": [
"ctrl+w"
]
},
{
"command": "newTab",
"keys": [
"ctrl+t"
]
}
]
}How to split the terminal into multiple screens
We can split the terminal views into multiple panes.
Vertical split panes terminal: alt+shift++
Horizontal split panes terminal: alt+shift+-
Further reading -
You can use these links to customize Microsft's new terminal.