xterm

What is xterm?

xterm is a terminal emulator library that can be used to create terminal interfaces in web applications. It provides a way to embed a terminal in a web page, allowing users to interact with a command-line interface directly from their browser.

What are xterm's main functionalities?

Basic Terminal Initialization

This code initializes a basic terminal instance and attaches it to a DOM element with the ID 'terminal-container'.

const { Terminal } = require('xterm');
const terminal = new Terminal();
terminal.open(document.getElementById('terminal-container'));

Customizing Terminal Appearance

This code demonstrates how to customize the appearance of the terminal, including the number of columns and rows, as well as the theme colors for the background and foreground.

const { Terminal } = require('xterm');
const terminal = new Terminal({
  cols: 80,
  rows: 24,
  theme: {
    background: '#1e1e1e',
    foreground: '#ffffff'
  }
});
terminal.open(document.getElementById('terminal-container'));

Handling Terminal Input

This code sets up an event listener to handle user input in the terminal. The input data is logged to the console.

const { Terminal } = require('xterm');
const terminal = new Terminal();
terminal.open(document.getElementById('terminal-container'));
terminal.onData(data => {
  console.log('User input:', data);
});

Writing Data to Terminal

This code demonstrates how to write data to the terminal. The text 'Hello, World!' is written to the terminal, followed by a carriage return and newline.

const { Terminal } = require('xterm');
const terminal = new Terminal();
terminal.open(document.getElementById('terminal-container'));
terminal.write('Hello, World!\r\n');

Other packages similar to xterm

blessed

Blessed is a curses-like library for creating terminal user interfaces in Node.js. It provides a higher-level abstraction for building complex terminal applications, including support for widgets like buttons, text boxes, and more. Compared to xterm, blessed is more focused on creating full-fledged terminal applications rather than embedding a terminal emulator in a web page.

terminal-kit

Terminal-kit is a comprehensive library for creating terminal applications in Node.js. It offers a wide range of features, including support for colors, styles, input handling, and more. Terminal-kit is similar to blessed in that it is designed for building terminal applications, but it provides more low-level control and flexibility. Unlike xterm, terminal-kit is not focused on web-based terminal emulation.

node-pty

Node-pty is a library that provides bindings to pseudo terminals (PTYs) in Node.js. It allows you to spawn and interact with terminal processes programmatically. While node-pty does not provide a terminal emulator like xterm, it can be used in conjunction with xterm to handle the backend process management for a web-based terminal interface.

README

xterm.js — xterm, in the browser

Xterm.js is a full xterm clone, written completely in JavaScript.

Xterm.js supplies a modular, event-based interface that lets developers build addons and themes that augment the experience of running a fully-featured terminal inside the browser.

Xterm.js serves as foundation for the terminal found at www.sourcelair.com.

Contribution and License Agreement

If you contribute code to this project, you are implicitly allowing your code to be distributed under the MIT license. You are also implicitly verifying that all code is your original work.

License

Copyright (c) 2014-2015, SourceLair, Private Company (www.sourcelair.com) (MIT License)

Copyright (c) 2012-2013, Christopher Jeffrey (MIT License)