github.com/microsoft/terminal ↗
The new Windows Terminal and the original Windows console host, all in the same place!
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Contributors
270
Lines of Code
14,562
From
2017-08-11
To
2020-12-18
About microsoft/terminal
Windows Terminal is a modern, feature-rich command-line application for Windows that brings tabs, rich text formatting, globalization support, theming, and configurability to terminal users. Alongside the new Terminal application, this repository also contains the source code for the Windows Console host (conhost.exe), which is the original Windows command-line infrastructure that has powered the system since the beginning.
The project modernized the aging Windows Console codebase by introducing cleaner architecture, safer containers using the Standard Template Library, and the Windows Implementation Libraries. This overhaul extracted reusable components including a DirectWrite-based text rendering engine, a text buffer supporting both UTF-16 and UTF-8, and a virtual terminal parser that both the Console and Terminal can leverage. Windows Terminal itself is built in C++ and can be deployed from the Microsoft Store with automatic updates, or installed via GitHub releases, WinGet, Chocolatey, or Scoop for those unable to use the Store.
Development requires Windows 10 build 19041 or later, Visual Studio 2022, the Windows 11 SDK, and PowerShell 7. The project actively welcomes community contributions and maintains detailed developer guidance covering coding style, project organization, and use of the Windows Implementation Libraries. The team communicates primarily through GitHub issues and provides multiple resources including a command-line blog, sample projects demonstrating Console API usage, and comprehensive documentation.