Contour - A modern C++ Terminal Emulator
IMPORTANT: THIS PROJECT IS IN BETA STAGE & ACTIVE DEVELOPMENT
contour is a modern terminal emulator, for everyday use. It is aiming for power users with a modern feature mindset.
Features
-
✅ Available on all 3 major platforms, Linux, OS/X, Windows (Windows is alpha stage). -
✅ GPU-accelerated rendering. -
✅ Font ligatures support (such as in Fira Code). -
✅ Unicode: Emoji support (-:🌈 💝 😛 👪 - including ZWJ, VS15, VS16 emojis :-) -
✅ Unicode: Grapheme cluster support -
✅ Bold and italic fonts -
✅ High-DPI support. -
✅ 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 (viaDECSM 2026/DECRM 2026) -
✅ Text reflow (configurable viaDECSM 2027/DECRM 2027) -
✅ Clickable hyperlinks via OSC 8 -
✅ Clipboard setting via OSC 52 -
✅ Sixel inline images -
✅ Terminal page buffer capture VT extension to quickly extract contents.
CLI - Command Line Interface
Usage:
contour [terminal] [config STRING] [profile STRING] [debug STRING] [live-config]
[working-directory STRING] [PROGRAM ARGS...]
contour help
contour version
contour parser-table
contour list-debug-tags
contour capture [logical] [timeout FLOAT] [lines INT] output STRING
Detailed description:
contour [terminal]
Spawns a new terminal application.
Options:
[config STRING] Path to configuration file to load at startup.
[default: /home/trapni/.config/contour/contour.yml]
[profile STRING] Terminal Profile to load.
[debug STRING] Enables debug logging, using a comma seperated list of tags.
[live-config] Enables live config reloading. [default: false]
[working-directory STRING] Sets initial working directory. [default: .]
[PROGRAM ARGS...] Executes given program instead of the configuration provided one.
Example Configuration File
~!@#$%^&*+=[]{}~?|│"
default_profile: ubuntu_vm
profiles:
ubuntu_vm:
shell: "ssh ubuntu-vm"
terminal_size:
columns: 130
lines: 30
environment:
TERM: xterm-256color
COLORTERM: truecolor
font:
size: 12
render_mode: lcd
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
">
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 font: size: 12 render_mode: lcd 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
Installing from source
Prerequisites Linux
This is tested on Ubuntu 19.04, but any recent Linux with latest C++17 compiler should do:
sudo apt install \
"g++-9" cmake pkg-config make libfreetype6-dev qtbase5-dev libqt5gui5 extra-cmake-modules \
libfontconfig1-dev libharfbuzz-dev libfontconfig-dev
To enable blur-behind feature on transparent background, you'll need the following packages:
sudo apt install libkf5windowsystem-dev
And 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.
Prerequisites Windows 10
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
Prerequisites Mac OS/X
brew install freetype fontconfig harfbuzz boost qt5
References
- 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)
License
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.
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