IMPORANT: THIS PROJECT IS IN ALPHA STAGE & ACTIVE DEVELOPMENT
contour is a modern terminal emulator, for everyday use. It is fully seperating emulation from
graphical representation for clear seperation of concerns but also for special features to come
before version 1.0 is released (headless terminal server with GUI & TUI frontends).
- ✅ Available on all 3 major platforms, Linux, OS/X, Windows.
- ✅ Unicode: Emoji support (-: 🌈 💝 😛 👪 - including ZWJ, VS15, VS16 emojis :-)
- ✅ Unicode: Grapheme cluster support
- ✅ Font ligatures support (such as in Fira Code).
- ✅ Bold and italic fonts
- ✅ GPU-accelerated rendering.
- ✅ Vertical Line Markers (quickly jump to markers in your history!)
- ✅ Blurred behind transparent background when using Windows 10 or KDE window manager on Linux.
- ✅ Runtime configuration reload
- ✅ 256-color and Truecolor support
- ✅ Key binding customization
- ✅ Color Schemes
- ✅ Profiles (grouped customization of: color scheme, login shell, and related behaviours)
- ✅ Synchronized rendering (via
DECSM 2026/DECRM 2026) - ✅ Clickable hyperlinks via OSC 8
- ✅ Clipboard setting via OSC 52
Usage: contour [options]
Contour Terminal Emulator
Options:
-h, --help Displays this help.
-v, --version Displays version information.
-c, --config <PATH> Path to configuration file to load at startup
[~/.config/contour/conour.yml].
-p, --profile <NAME> Terminal Profile to load.word_delimiters: " /\\()\"'-.,:;<>~!@#$%^&*+=[]{}~?|│"
default_profile: ubuntu_vm
profiles:
ubuntu_vm:
shell: "ssh ubuntu-vm"
terminal_size:
columns: 130
lines: 30
environment:
TERM: xterm-256color
COLORTERM: truecolor
fontSize: 12
font:
regular: "Fira Code"
bold: "Fira Code:style=bold"
italic: "Hack:style=italic"
bold_italic: "Hack:style=bold italic"
emoji: "emoji"
tab_width: 8
history:
limit: 8000
scroll_multiplier: 3
auto_scroll_on_update: true
cursor:
shape: block
blinking: true
background:
opacity: 0.9
blur: false
colors: google_dark
color_schemes:
google_dark:
cursor: '#b0b030'
selection: '#30c0c0'
default:
background: '#1d1f21'
foreground: '#c5c8c6'
normal:
black: '#1d1f21'
red: '#cc342b'
green: '#198844'
yellow: '#fba922'
blue: '#3971ed'
magenta: '#a36ac7'
cyan: '#3971ed'
white: '#c5c8c6'
bright:
black: '#969896'
red: '#cc342b'
green: '#198844'
yellow: '#fba922'
blue: '#3971ed'
magenta: '#a36ac7'
cyan: '#3971ed'
white: '#ffffff'
input_mapping:
- { mods: [Alt], key: Enter, action: ToggleFullscreen }
- { mods: [Control, Alt], key: S, action: ScreenshotVT }
- { mods: [Control, Shift], key: Equal, action: IncreaseFontSize }
- { mods: [Control, Shift], key: Minus, action: DecreaseFontSize }
- { mods: [Control, Shift], key: N, action: NewTerminal }
- { mods: [Control], mouse: WheelUp, action: IncreaseFontSize }
- { mods: [Control], mouse: WheelDown, action: DecreaseFontSize }
- { mods: [Alt], mouse: WheelUp, action: IncreaseOpacity }
- { mods: [Alt], mouse: WheelDown, action: DecreaseOpacity }
- { mods: [Control], key: '0', action: ResetFontSize }
- { mods: [Shift], mouse: WheelUp, action: ScrollPageUp }
- { mods: [Shift], mouse: WheelDown, action: ScrollPageDown }
- { mods: [], mouse: WheelUp, action: ScrollUp }
- { mods: [], mouse: WheelDown, action: ScrollDown }
- { mods: [Shift], key: UpArrow, action: ScrollOneUp }
- { mods: [Shift], key: DownArrow, action: ScrollOneDown }
- { mods: [Shift], key: PageUp, action: ScrollPageUp }
- { mods: [Shift], key: PageDown, action: ScrollPageDown }
- { mods: [Shift], key: Home, action: ScrollToTop }
- { mods: [Shift], key: End, action: ScrollToBottom }
- { mods: [Alt, Shift], key: 'k', action: ScrollMarkUp }
- { mods: [Alt, Shift], key: 'j', action: ScrollMarkDown }
logging:
file: "/path/to/contour.log"
parse_errors: true
invalid_output: true
unsupported_output: true
raw_input: false
raw_output: false
trace_input: false
trace_output: false
This is tested on Ubuntu 19.04, but any recent Linux with latest C++17 compiler should do:
sudo apt install \
"g++-9" cmake libfreetype6-dev qtbase5-dev libqt5gui5 extra-cmake-modules \
libfontconfig1-dev libharfbuzz-devTo enable blur-behind feature on transparent background, you'll need the following packages:
sudo apt install libkf5windowsystem-devAnd set pass -DCONTOUR_BLUR_PLATFORM_KWIN=ON to cmake when configuring the project.
In case you want to improve performance slightly and run at at least Linux, you can add
-DLIBTERMINAL_EXECUTION_PAR=ON to the cmake configuration and make sure to have libtbb-dev
installed beforehand.
For Windows, you must have Windows 10, 2018 Fall Creators Update, and Visual Studio 2019, installed. It will neither build nor run on any prior Windows OS, due to libterminal making use of ConPTY API.
vcpkg install freetype fontconfig harfbuzz qt5-base
brew install freetype fontconfig harfbuzz boost qt5
- VT510: VT510 Manual, see Chapter 5.
- ECMA-35: Character Code Structure and Extension Techniques
- ECMA-43: 8-bit Coded Character Set Structure and Rules
- ECMA-48: Control Functions for Coded Character Sets
- ISO/IEC 8613-6: Character content architectures
- xterm: xterm control sequences
- console_codes Linux console codes
- Summary of ANSI standards for ASCII terminals
- Text Terminal HOWTO (Chapter 7.2, PTY)
Contour - A modern C++ Terminal Emulator
-------------------------------------------
Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.