termonad
Terminal emulator configurable in Haskell
https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
Version on this page: | 2.0.0.0 |
LTS Haskell 22.21: | 4.5.0.0 |
Stackage Nightly 2024-05-11: | 4.6.0.0 |
Latest on Hackage: | 4.6.0.0 |
termonad-2.0.0.0@sha256:151abc7e8b62aae1f45e9d09f37e4f8b287923b5a56893ee6e497c4edb5a76cf,8637
Termonad
Termonad is a terminal emulator configurable in Haskell. It is extremely customizable and provides hooks to modify the default behavior. It can be thought of as the “XMonad” of terminal emulators.
Table of Contents
Installation
Termonad can be installed on any system as long as the necessary GTK libraries are available. The following are instructions for installing Termonad on a few different distributions and systems. If the given steps don’t work for you, or you want to add instructions for an additional system, please send a pull request.
The following steps use the
stack
build tool to build
Termonad, but cabal
can be used as well. Steps for
installing stack
can be found on
this page.
Arch Linux
First, you must install the required GTK system libraries:
$ pacman -S vte3
In order to install Termonad, clone this repository and run stack install
.
This will install the termonad
binary to ~/.local/bin/
:
$ git clone https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
$ cd termonad/
$ stack install
Ubuntu / Debian
First, you must install the required GTK system libraries:
$ apt-get install gobject-introspection libgirepository1.0-dev libgtk-3-dev libvte-2.91-dev
In order to install Termonad, clone this repository and run stack install
.
This will install the termonad
binary to ~/.local/bin/
:
$ git clone https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
$ cd termonad/
$ stack install
Nix
If you have nix
installed, you should be able to use it to build Termonad.
This means that it will work on NixOS, or with nix
on another distro. There
are two different ways to use nix
to build Termonad:
The first is using stack
. The following commands install stack
for your
user, clone this repository, and install the termonad
binary to ~/.local/bin/
:
$ nix-env -i stack
$ git clone https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
$ cd termonad/
$ stack --nix install
The second is using the normal nix-build
machinery. The following commands
clone this repository and build the termonad
binary at ./result/bin/
:
$ git clone https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
$ cd termonad/
$ nix-build
Mac OS X
Building and installing Termonad on Mac OS X should be possible with any of the following three methods:
-
Install the required system libraries (like GTK and VTE) by hand, then use
stack
to build Termonad.This is probably the easiest method. You don’t have to understand anything about
nix
. However, it is slightly annoying to have to install GTK and VTE by hand. -
Use
nix
to install both the required system libraries and Termonad itself.If you are a nix user and want an easy way to install Termonad, this is the recommended method.
-
Use
nix
to install install the required system libraries, andstack
to build Termonad.If you are a nix user, but want to use
stack
to actually do development on Termonad, usingstack
may be easier than usingcabal
.
The following sections describe each method.
Installing with just stack
(currently no instructions available. please send a PR adding instructions if you get termonad to build using this method.)
Installing with just nix
nix
can be used to install Termonad with the following steps, assuming you
have nix
installed. These commands
clone this repository and build the termonad
binary at ./result/bin/
:
$ git clone https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
$ cd termonad/
$ nix-build
Installing with stack
using nix
stack
can be used in conjunction with nix
to install Termonad. nix
will
handle installing system dependencies (like GTK and VTE), while stack
will
handle compiling and installing Haskell packages.
You must have nix
installed.
You will also need stack
installed. You can do that with the following command:
$ nix-env -i stack
After stack
is installed, you will need to clone Termonad and build it:
$ git clone https://github.com/cdepillabout/termonad
$ cd termonad/
$ stack --nix install
This will install the termonad
binary to ~/.local/bin/
.
Windows
(currently no instructions available. please send a PR adding instructions if you get termonad to build.)
How to use Termonad
Termonad is similar to XMonad. The above steps will install a termonad
binary
somewhere on your system. If you have installed Termonad using stack
, the
termonad
binary will be in ~/.local/bin/
. This binary is a version of
Termonad configured with default settings. You can try running it to get an idea
of what Termonad is like:
$ ~/.local/bin/termonad
The following section describes the default key bindings.
If you would like to configure Termonad with your own settings, first you will
need to create a Haskell file called ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
. A following
section gives an example configuration file.
If this configuration file exists, when the ~/.local/bin/termonad
binary
launches, it will try to use GHC to compile the configuration file. If GHC
is able to successfully compile the configuration file, a separate binary will
be created called something like ~/.cache/termonad/termonad-linux-x86_64
.
This binary file can be thought of as your own personal Termonad, configured
with all your own settings.
When you run ~/.local/bin/termonad
, it will re-exec
~/.cache/termonad/termonad-linux-x86_64
if it exists.
However, there is one difficulty with this setup. In order for the
~/.local/bin/termonad
binary to be able to compile your
~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
configuration file, Termonad needs to know
where GHC is, as well as where all your Haskell packages live. This presents
some difficulties that will be discussed in a following section.
Default Key Bindings
Termonad provides the following default key bindings.
Key binding | Action |
---|---|
Ctrl Shift t | Open new tab. |
Ctrl Shift w | Close tab. |
Ctrl Shift f | Open Find dialog for searching for a regex. |
Ctrl Shift p | Find the regex above the current position. |
Ctrl Shift i | Find the regex below the current position. |
Ctrl + | Increase font size. |
Ctrl - | Decrease font size. |
Alt (number key) | Switch to tab number . For example, Alt 2 switches to tab 2. |
Configuring Termonad
The following is an example Termonad configuration file. You should save this to
~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
. You can find more information on the available
configuration options within the
Termonad.Config
module.
{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}
module Main where
import Termonad.App (defaultMain)
import Termonad.Config
( FontConfig, FontSize(FontSizePoints), Option(Set)
, ShowScrollbar(ShowScrollbarAlways), defaultConfigOptions, defaultFontConfig
, defaultTMConfig, fontConfig, fontFamily, fontSize, options, showScrollbar
)
import Termonad.Config.Colour
( AlphaColour, ColourConfig, addColourExtension, createColour
, createColourExtension, cursorBgColour, defaultColourConfig
)
-- | This sets the color of the cursor in the terminal.
--
-- This uses the "Data.Colour" module to define a dark-red color.
-- There are many default colors defined in "Data.Colour.Names".
cursBgColour :: AlphaColour Double
cursBgColour = createColour 204 0 0
-- | This sets the colors used for the terminal. We only specify the background
-- color of the cursor.
colConf :: ColourConfig (AlphaColour Double)
colConf =
defaultColourConfig
{ cursorBgColour = Set cursBgColour
}
-- | This defines the font for the terminal.
fontConf :: FontConfig
fontConf =
defaultFontConfig
{ fontFamily = "DejaVu Sans Mono"
, fontSize = FontSizePoints 13
}
main :: IO ()
main = do
colExt <- createColourExtension colConf
let termonadConf =
defaultTMConfig
{ options =
defaultConfigOptions
{ fontConfig = fontConf
-- Make sure the scrollbar is always visible.
, showScrollbar = ShowScrollbarAlways
}
}
`addColourExtension` colExt
defaultMain termonadConf
There are other example configuration files in the example-config/ directory.
Compiling Local Settings
If you launch Termonad by calling ~/.local/bin/termonad
, it will try to
compile the ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
file if it exists. The problem is
that ~/.local/bin/termonad
needs to be able to see GHC and the required
Haskell libraries to be able to compile ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
.
There are a couple solutions to this problem, listed in the sections below.
(These steps are definitely confusing. I would love to figure out a better way to do this. Please submit an issue or PR if you have a good idea about how to fix this.)
Running with stack
If you originally compiled Termonad with stack
, you can use stack
to
execute Termonad. First, you must change to the directory with the Termonad
source code. From there, you can run stack exec
:
$ cd termonad/ # change to the termonad source code directory
$ stack exec -- termonad
stack
will pick up the correct GHC version and libraries from the
stack.yaml
and termonad.cabal
file. termonad
will be run in an
environment with GHC available. termonad
will use this GHC and libraries to
compile your ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
file. It if succeeds, it should
create a ~/.cache/termonad/termonad-linux-x86_64
binary.
If you need extra Haskell libraries available when compiling your
~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
file, you can specify them to stack exec
:
$ stack exec --package lens --package conduit -- termonad
The problem with this is that stack exec
changes quite a few of your
environment variables. It is not recommended to actually run Termonad from
within stack exec
. After you run stack exec -- termonad
and let it
recompile your ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
file, exit Termonad.
Re-run Termonad by calling it directly. Termonad will notice that
~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
hasn’t changed since
~/.cache/termonad/termonad-linux-x86_64
has been recompiled, so it will
directly execute ~/.cache/termonad/termonad-linux-x86_64
.
Running with nix
Building Termonad with nix
(by running nix-build
in the top
directory) sets it up so that Termonad can see GHC. Termonad should be able
to compile the ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
file by default.
If you’re interested in how this works, or want to change which Haskell
packages are available from your ~/.config/termonad/termonad.hs
file, please
see the documentation in the
.nix-helpers/termonad-with-packages.nix
file.
Goals
Termonad has the following goals:
-
fully configurable in Haskell
There are already many good terminal emulators. However, there are no terminal emulators fully configurable in Haskell. Termonad fills this niche.
-
flexible
Most people only need a terminal emulator that lets you change the font-size, cursor color, etc. They don’t need tons of configuration options. Termonad should be for people that like lots of configuration options. Termonad should provide many hooks to allow the user full control over its behavior.
-
stable
Termonad should be able to be used everyday as your main terminal emulator. It should not crash for any reason. If you experience a crash, please file an issue or a pull request!
-
good documentation
The documentation for Termonad on Hackage should be good. You shouldn’t have to guess at what certain data types or functions do. If you have a hard time understanding anything in the documentation, please submit an issue or PR.
Where to get help
If you find a bug in Termonad, please either send a PR fixing it or create an issue explaining it.
If you just need help with configuring Termonad, you can either join the Gitter room or #termonad on irc.freenode.net.
Contributions
Contributions are highly appreciated. Termonad is currently missing many helpful configuration options and behavior hooks. If there is something you would like to add, please submit an issue or PR.
Maintainers
Changes
2.0.0.0
- Added menu option to search for a regex within the terminal output. This removes support for versions of VTE-2.91 older than 0.46. This means that compiling on older versions of Debian and Ubuntu may no longer work. #118
1.3.0.0
- Change all uses of
Colour
toAlphaColour
inTermonad.Config.Colour
. Users should now useAlphaColour
instead ofColour
. Also, all uses ofsRGB24
should be replaced withcreateColour
. This change is mechanical and should not affect how Termonad works at all. Thanks to @jecaro and @amir! #116
1.2.0.0
- Got the code for setting the backgroud color of the terminal actually
working. Thanks @dakotaclemenceplaza.
#111
- This changes the type of
ColourConfig
to make the foreground and background colors of the terminal optional.
- This changes the type of
- Various cleanup in the nix files.
1.1.0.0
- Added an example of how to setup a solarized color scheme. Thanks @craigem. #90 and #103
- Various fixes in the nix files.
- Add a menu option to change the font size at runtime. You should be able to
do this with the
Ctrl-+
andCtrl--
keys. #95 - Get building with GHC 8.6. Thanks @clinty. #98
1.0.1.0
- Stop using the
widgetSetFocusOnClick
function, which is not supported on older versions of GTK. This lets Termonad be compiled with older versions of GTK. #87. - Add CI. #87.
- Support versions of VTE-2.91 older than 0.44. #87.
- Add some functions for converting from a list to a
Vec
inTermonad.Config.Vec
:fromListVec
andfromListVec_
. Commit 883eb98b5f. - Fix the paste hotkey. #86.
1.0.0.0
-
The API for configuring Termonad is now completely different. Many, many changes have gone into this version. You should approach it as a completely different application.
The CHANGELOG will be kept up-to-date for future releases.
0.2.1.0
- Make sure the window title is set to “Termonad”.
- Relabel tabs when termonad is started.
0.2.0.0
- Open dialog asking if you want to quit when you try to use your WM to quit.
- Termonad will attempt to open up a new terminal in the working directory of the current terminal.
- Make sure termonad won’t crash if dyre can’t find GHC.
- Add a few more ways to compile on NixOS.
- Add an icon for termonad.
0.1.0.0
- Initial release.