Dynamic text wrapping of terminal output
I am specifically looking for is dynamic formatting of output. In every terminal emulator I can remember having used in Linux, when some program prints to the screen, the output gets formatted to fit to the terminal window so that longer lines will wrap around. If I then change the width of the window, the previous wrapped around formatting still remains.
On OSX, Terminal.app acts differently. The text is still formatted for the current size of window just as on Linux terminal emulators. However if I re-size the window, the text is automatically reformatted to match the new dimensions.
This is super useful when, after the running a utility, I realize that I didn't make the window wide enough to show all the output clearly. On an especially slow running utility, it can be frustrating to need to run everything all over again only to get better formatting. I could redirect the output to a program like less, view or gview. However this just feels like too much work to do every time I run a utility that might not format well with the current window dimensions. Also, as far as I know less doesn't support bash style text coloration.
Does anyone know of a Linux terminal emulator that has this behavior? It doesn't need to be out of the box behavior; I am willing to monkey with configuration settings to get something like this working. I have already poked around a number of terminal emulators on Linux to see if they support this, but I don't really have the time to try every single one of them. There are just too many! If truly no program exists that does this, is it because no one is trying to create this behavior? Is there some technical limitation on Linux in specific that does not allow this (don't see how this could be the case)?
terminal
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
bumped to the homepage by Community♦ 12 mins ago
This question has answers that may be good or bad; the system has marked it active so that they can be reviewed.
|
show 3 more comments
I am specifically looking for is dynamic formatting of output. In every terminal emulator I can remember having used in Linux, when some program prints to the screen, the output gets formatted to fit to the terminal window so that longer lines will wrap around. If I then change the width of the window, the previous wrapped around formatting still remains.
On OSX, Terminal.app acts differently. The text is still formatted for the current size of window just as on Linux terminal emulators. However if I re-size the window, the text is automatically reformatted to match the new dimensions.
This is super useful when, after the running a utility, I realize that I didn't make the window wide enough to show all the output clearly. On an especially slow running utility, it can be frustrating to need to run everything all over again only to get better formatting. I could redirect the output to a program like less, view or gview. However this just feels like too much work to do every time I run a utility that might not format well with the current window dimensions. Also, as far as I know less doesn't support bash style text coloration.
Does anyone know of a Linux terminal emulator that has this behavior? It doesn't need to be out of the box behavior; I am willing to monkey with configuration settings to get something like this working. I have already poked around a number of terminal emulators on Linux to see if they support this, but I don't really have the time to try every single one of them. There are just too many! If truly no program exists that does this, is it because no one is trying to create this behavior? Is there some technical limitation on Linux in specific that does not allow this (don't see how this could be the case)?
terminal
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
bumped to the homepage by Community♦ 12 mins ago
This question has answers that may be good or bad; the system has marked it active so that they can be reviewed.
2
Gnome terminal does this,
– Braiam
Aug 6 '14 at 22:09
It would be very easy to make this a short question (and then you wouldn't need to apologize for anything). Just keep the third and forth paragraphs (removing the "Let me explain further..." bit. Finish off with the first line of the last paragraph.
– drs
Aug 6 '14 at 22:15
@Braiam I haven't used Gnome terminal in a while. I have been on xfce (and thus xfce terminal) pretty much since gnome3 came out. I just installed gnome terminal. It doesn't act that way by default, but I will poke around in the settings for a bit.
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 0:12
@Braiam I have been looked through all the preferences I can find and I can't seem to find a way in gnome terminal to enable this. Any tips on how to get this working?
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 3:55
@eestrada To save you some time, I've checked Terminator, Konsole, and Xterm, and none of those do this. FWIWlessdoes support colour with the-Rflag, but you probably need to tell the previous command in the pipe to send colour. (e.g.ls -l | lessfails, butls -l --color=always| less -Rworks.) Finally, I know thatlessandvimdynamically word wrap with changing window sizes, so perhaps something likescreenortmuxmight do it.
– Sparhawk
Aug 7 '14 at 5:00
|
show 3 more comments
I am specifically looking for is dynamic formatting of output. In every terminal emulator I can remember having used in Linux, when some program prints to the screen, the output gets formatted to fit to the terminal window so that longer lines will wrap around. If I then change the width of the window, the previous wrapped around formatting still remains.
On OSX, Terminal.app acts differently. The text is still formatted for the current size of window just as on Linux terminal emulators. However if I re-size the window, the text is automatically reformatted to match the new dimensions.
This is super useful when, after the running a utility, I realize that I didn't make the window wide enough to show all the output clearly. On an especially slow running utility, it can be frustrating to need to run everything all over again only to get better formatting. I could redirect the output to a program like less, view or gview. However this just feels like too much work to do every time I run a utility that might not format well with the current window dimensions. Also, as far as I know less doesn't support bash style text coloration.
Does anyone know of a Linux terminal emulator that has this behavior? It doesn't need to be out of the box behavior; I am willing to monkey with configuration settings to get something like this working. I have already poked around a number of terminal emulators on Linux to see if they support this, but I don't really have the time to try every single one of them. There are just too many! If truly no program exists that does this, is it because no one is trying to create this behavior? Is there some technical limitation on Linux in specific that does not allow this (don't see how this could be the case)?
terminal
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
I am specifically looking for is dynamic formatting of output. In every terminal emulator I can remember having used in Linux, when some program prints to the screen, the output gets formatted to fit to the terminal window so that longer lines will wrap around. If I then change the width of the window, the previous wrapped around formatting still remains.
On OSX, Terminal.app acts differently. The text is still formatted for the current size of window just as on Linux terminal emulators. However if I re-size the window, the text is automatically reformatted to match the new dimensions.
This is super useful when, after the running a utility, I realize that I didn't make the window wide enough to show all the output clearly. On an especially slow running utility, it can be frustrating to need to run everything all over again only to get better formatting. I could redirect the output to a program like less, view or gview. However this just feels like too much work to do every time I run a utility that might not format well with the current window dimensions. Also, as far as I know less doesn't support bash style text coloration.
Does anyone know of a Linux terminal emulator that has this behavior? It doesn't need to be out of the box behavior; I am willing to monkey with configuration settings to get something like this working. I have already poked around a number of terminal emulators on Linux to see if they support this, but I don't really have the time to try every single one of them. There are just too many! If truly no program exists that does this, is it because no one is trying to create this behavior? Is there some technical limitation on Linux in specific that does not allow this (don't see how this could be the case)?
terminal
terminal
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
edited Aug 7 '14 at 3:52
eestrada
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
asked Aug 6 '14 at 22:04
eestradaeestrada
35318
35318
bumped to the homepage by Community♦ 12 mins ago
This question has answers that may be good or bad; the system has marked it active so that they can be reviewed.
bumped to the homepage by Community♦ 12 mins ago
This question has answers that may be good or bad; the system has marked it active so that they can be reviewed.
2
Gnome terminal does this,
– Braiam
Aug 6 '14 at 22:09
It would be very easy to make this a short question (and then you wouldn't need to apologize for anything). Just keep the third and forth paragraphs (removing the "Let me explain further..." bit. Finish off with the first line of the last paragraph.
– drs
Aug 6 '14 at 22:15
@Braiam I haven't used Gnome terminal in a while. I have been on xfce (and thus xfce terminal) pretty much since gnome3 came out. I just installed gnome terminal. It doesn't act that way by default, but I will poke around in the settings for a bit.
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 0:12
@Braiam I have been looked through all the preferences I can find and I can't seem to find a way in gnome terminal to enable this. Any tips on how to get this working?
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 3:55
@eestrada To save you some time, I've checked Terminator, Konsole, and Xterm, and none of those do this. FWIWlessdoes support colour with the-Rflag, but you probably need to tell the previous command in the pipe to send colour. (e.g.ls -l | lessfails, butls -l --color=always| less -Rworks.) Finally, I know thatlessandvimdynamically word wrap with changing window sizes, so perhaps something likescreenortmuxmight do it.
– Sparhawk
Aug 7 '14 at 5:00
|
show 3 more comments
2
Gnome terminal does this,
– Braiam
Aug 6 '14 at 22:09
It would be very easy to make this a short question (and then you wouldn't need to apologize for anything). Just keep the third and forth paragraphs (removing the "Let me explain further..." bit. Finish off with the first line of the last paragraph.
– drs
Aug 6 '14 at 22:15
@Braiam I haven't used Gnome terminal in a while. I have been on xfce (and thus xfce terminal) pretty much since gnome3 came out. I just installed gnome terminal. It doesn't act that way by default, but I will poke around in the settings for a bit.
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 0:12
@Braiam I have been looked through all the preferences I can find and I can't seem to find a way in gnome terminal to enable this. Any tips on how to get this working?
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 3:55
@eestrada To save you some time, I've checked Terminator, Konsole, and Xterm, and none of those do this. FWIWlessdoes support colour with the-Rflag, but you probably need to tell the previous command in the pipe to send colour. (e.g.ls -l | lessfails, butls -l --color=always| less -Rworks.) Finally, I know thatlessandvimdynamically word wrap with changing window sizes, so perhaps something likescreenortmuxmight do it.
– Sparhawk
Aug 7 '14 at 5:00
2
2
Gnome terminal does this,
– Braiam
Aug 6 '14 at 22:09
Gnome terminal does this,
– Braiam
Aug 6 '14 at 22:09
It would be very easy to make this a short question (and then you wouldn't need to apologize for anything). Just keep the third and forth paragraphs (removing the "Let me explain further..." bit. Finish off with the first line of the last paragraph.
– drs
Aug 6 '14 at 22:15
It would be very easy to make this a short question (and then you wouldn't need to apologize for anything). Just keep the third and forth paragraphs (removing the "Let me explain further..." bit. Finish off with the first line of the last paragraph.
– drs
Aug 6 '14 at 22:15
@Braiam I haven't used Gnome terminal in a while. I have been on xfce (and thus xfce terminal) pretty much since gnome3 came out. I just installed gnome terminal. It doesn't act that way by default, but I will poke around in the settings for a bit.
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 0:12
@Braiam I haven't used Gnome terminal in a while. I have been on xfce (and thus xfce terminal) pretty much since gnome3 came out. I just installed gnome terminal. It doesn't act that way by default, but I will poke around in the settings for a bit.
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 0:12
@Braiam I have been looked through all the preferences I can find and I can't seem to find a way in gnome terminal to enable this. Any tips on how to get this working?
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 3:55
@Braiam I have been looked through all the preferences I can find and I can't seem to find a way in gnome terminal to enable this. Any tips on how to get this working?
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 3:55
@eestrada To save you some time, I've checked Terminator, Konsole, and Xterm, and none of those do this. FWIW
less does support colour with the -R flag, but you probably need to tell the previous command in the pipe to send colour. (e.g. ls -l | less fails, but ls -l --color=always| less -R works.) Finally, I know that less and vim dynamically word wrap with changing window sizes, so perhaps something like screen or tmux might do it.– Sparhawk
Aug 7 '14 at 5:00
@eestrada To save you some time, I've checked Terminator, Konsole, and Xterm, and none of those do this. FWIW
less does support colour with the -R flag, but you probably need to tell the previous command in the pipe to send colour. (e.g. ls -l | less fails, but ls -l --color=always| less -R works.) Finally, I know that less and vim dynamically word wrap with changing window sizes, so perhaps something like screen or tmux might do it.– Sparhawk
Aug 7 '14 at 5:00
|
show 3 more comments
1 Answer
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After following a link in a comment from @Braiam in the question's comments, it seems I have found at least one alternative.
rxvt-unicode (sometimes called urxvt based on its utility name) has this feature. However, as a lightweight terminal for X, it seems to have relatively few default UI features compared to alternatives like Gnome terminal. Also, as an X utility, its appearance is generally boxy and doesn't fit into the default themes of most desktops environments such as gnome, kde, xfce, etc..
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
1
gnome-terminalhas already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment'sterminology.
– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
add a comment |
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After following a link in a comment from @Braiam in the question's comments, it seems I have found at least one alternative.
rxvt-unicode (sometimes called urxvt based on its utility name) has this feature. However, as a lightweight terminal for X, it seems to have relatively few default UI features compared to alternatives like Gnome terminal. Also, as an X utility, its appearance is generally boxy and doesn't fit into the default themes of most desktops environments such as gnome, kde, xfce, etc..
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
1
gnome-terminalhas already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment'sterminology.
– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
add a comment |
After following a link in a comment from @Braiam in the question's comments, it seems I have found at least one alternative.
rxvt-unicode (sometimes called urxvt based on its utility name) has this feature. However, as a lightweight terminal for X, it seems to have relatively few default UI features compared to alternatives like Gnome terminal. Also, as an X utility, its appearance is generally boxy and doesn't fit into the default themes of most desktops environments such as gnome, kde, xfce, etc..
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
1
gnome-terminalhas already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment'sterminology.
– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
add a comment |
After following a link in a comment from @Braiam in the question's comments, it seems I have found at least one alternative.
rxvt-unicode (sometimes called urxvt based on its utility name) has this feature. However, as a lightweight terminal for X, it seems to have relatively few default UI features compared to alternatives like Gnome terminal. Also, as an X utility, its appearance is generally boxy and doesn't fit into the default themes of most desktops environments such as gnome, kde, xfce, etc..
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
After following a link in a comment from @Braiam in the question's comments, it seems I have found at least one alternative.
rxvt-unicode (sometimes called urxvt based on its utility name) has this feature. However, as a lightweight terminal for X, it seems to have relatively few default UI features compared to alternatives like Gnome terminal. Also, as an X utility, its appearance is generally boxy and doesn't fit into the default themes of most desktops environments such as gnome, kde, xfce, etc..
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
edited Aug 9 '14 at 19:39
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
answered Aug 9 '14 at 18:47
eestradaeestrada
35318
35318
1
gnome-terminalhas already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment'sterminology.
– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
add a comment |
1
gnome-terminalhas already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment'sterminology.
– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
1
1
gnome-terminal has already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment's terminology.– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
gnome-terminal has already supported this feature for more than a year now, and so does enlightenment's terminology.– egmont
Apr 25 '15 at 18:04
add a comment |
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2
Gnome terminal does this,
– Braiam
Aug 6 '14 at 22:09
It would be very easy to make this a short question (and then you wouldn't need to apologize for anything). Just keep the third and forth paragraphs (removing the "Let me explain further..." bit. Finish off with the first line of the last paragraph.
– drs
Aug 6 '14 at 22:15
@Braiam I haven't used Gnome terminal in a while. I have been on xfce (and thus xfce terminal) pretty much since gnome3 came out. I just installed gnome terminal. It doesn't act that way by default, but I will poke around in the settings for a bit.
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 0:12
@Braiam I have been looked through all the preferences I can find and I can't seem to find a way in gnome terminal to enable this. Any tips on how to get this working?
– eestrada
Aug 7 '14 at 3:55
@eestrada To save you some time, I've checked Terminator, Konsole, and Xterm, and none of those do this. FWIW
lessdoes support colour with the-Rflag, but you probably need to tell the previous command in the pipe to send colour. (e.g.ls -l | lessfails, butls -l --color=always| less -Rworks.) Finally, I know thatlessandvimdynamically word wrap with changing window sizes, so perhaps something likescreenortmuxmight do it.– Sparhawk
Aug 7 '14 at 5:00