xfce4-terminal is what is known as an X terminal emulator, often
referred to as terminal or shell. It provides an equivalent to the
old-fashioned text screen on your desktop, but one which can easily share
the screen with other graphical applications. Windows users may already be
familiar with the MS-DOS Prompt utility, which has the analogous function of
offering a DOS command-line under Windows, though one should note that the
UNIX CLI offer far more power and ease of use than does DOS.
xfce4-terminal emulates the xterm application developed by the X
Consortium. In turn, the xterm application emulates the DEC VT102 terminal
and also supports the DEC VT220 escape sequences. An escape sequence is a
series of characters that start with the Esc character. xfce4-terminal
accepts all of the escape sequences that the VT102 and VT220 terminals use
for functions such as to position the cursor and to clear the screen.
Here is a summary of all the options, grouped by type.
Explanations are in the following sections.
General Options
-h, --help; -V, --version;
--disable-server; --color-table;
--default-display=display;
--default-working-directory=directory
Window or Tab Separators
--tab; --window
Tab Options
-x, --execute; -e,
--command=command; -T,
--title=title;
--dynamic-title-mode=mode;
--initial-title=title;
--working-directory=directory; -H, --hold;
--active-tab; --color-text=color;
--color-bg=color
Window Options
--display=display;
--drop-down; --geometry=geometry;
--role=role; --startup-id=string;
-I, --icon=icon; --fullscreen; --maximize;
--minimize; --show-menubar, --hide-menubar;
--show-borders, --hide-borders; --show-toolbar,
--hide-toolbar; --show-scrollbar, --hide-scrollbar;
--font=font; --zoom=zoom
-h, --help
List the various command line options supported by
xfce4-terminal and exit
-V, --version
Display version information and exit
--disable-server
Do not register with the D-BUS session message bus
--color-table
Echo the color codes
--default-display=display
Default X display to use.
--default-working-directory=directory
Set directory as the default working directory for
the terminal
--tab
Open a new tab in the last-specified window; more than
one of these options can be provided.
If you use this as the first option, without --window separators,
the last window will be re-used.
--window
Open a new window containing one tab; more than one of
these options can be provided.
-x, --execute
Execute the remainder of the command line inside the
terminal
-e, --command=command
Execute command inside the terminal
-T, --title=title
Set title as the window title for the terminal
(ignores dynamically-set title)
--dynamic-title-mode=mode
Set mode as the dynamically-set title mode for the
terminal, one of: 'replace', 'before', 'after', 'none'
--initial-title=title
Set title as the initial window title for the
terminal (respects dynamically-set title)
--working-directory=directory
Set directory as the working directory for the
terminal
-H, --hold
Causes the terminal to be kept around after the child
command has terminated
--active-tab
Makes the terminal active: useful when a terminal window
contains multiple tabs
--color-text=color
Set color as the text color for the terminal per
the following specification:
https://developer.gnome.org/gdk3/stable/gdk3-RGBA-Colors.html#gdk-rgba-parse
--color-bg=color
Set color as the background color for the terminal
per the following specification:
https://developer.gnome.org/gdk3/stable/gdk3-RGBA-Colors.html#gdk-rgba-parse
--display=display
X display to use for the last- specified window.
--drop-down
Will start the window in drop-down mode (also called a
Quake-style terminal). This will only apply to the first window started with
this option. It is advised to bind this to a shortcut in the keyboard
preferences.
--geometry=geometry
Sets the geometry of the last-specified window to
geometry. Read
X(7) for more information on how to specify
window geometries.
--role=role
Sets the window role of the last-specified window to
role. Applies to only one window and can be specified once for each
window you create from the command line. The role is a unique
identifier for the window to be used when restoring a session.
--startup-id=string
Specifies the startup notification id for the
last-specified window. Used internally to forward the startup notification id
when using the D-BUS service.
-I, --icon=icon
Set the terminal's icon as an icon name or
filename.
--fullscreen
Set the last-specified window into fullscreen mode;
applies to only one window; can be specified once for each window you create
from the command line.
--maximize
Set the last-specified window into maximized mode;
applies to only one window; can be specified once for each window you create
from the command line.
--minimize
Set the last-specified window into minimized mode;
applies to only one window; can be specified once for each window you create
from the command line.
--show-menubar
Turn on the menubar for the last-specified window. Can be
specified once for each window you create from the command line.
--hide-menubar
Turn off the menubar for the last-specified window. Can
be specified once for each window you create from the command line.
--show-borders
Turn on the window decorations for the last-specified
window. Applies to only one window. Can be specified once for each window you
create from the command line.
--hide-borders
Turn off the window decorations for the last-specified
window. Applies to only one window. Can be specified once for each window you
create from the command line.
--show-toolbar
Turn on the toolbar for the last-specified window.
Applies to only one window. Can be specified once for each window you create
from the command line.
--hide-toolbar
Turn off the toolbar for the last-specified window.
Applies to only one window. Can be specified once for each window you create
from the command line.
--show-scrollbar
Turn on the scrollbar for the last-specified window.
Scrollbar position is taken from the settings; if position is None, the
default position is Right side. Applies to only one window. Can be specified
once for each window you create from the command line.
--hide-scrollbar
Turn off the scrollbar for the last-specified window.
Applies to only one window. Can be specified once for each window you create
from the command line.
--font=font
Set the terminal font.
--zoom=zoom
Set the zoom level: the font size will be multiplied by
this level. The range is from -7 to 7, default is 0. Each step multiplies the
size by 1.2, i.e. level 7 is 3.5831808 (1.2^7) times larger than the default
size.
xfce4-terminal uses the Basedir Specification as defined on
Freedesktop.org[1] to locate its data and configuration files. This
means that file locations will be specified as a path relative to the
directories described in the specification.
${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}
The first base directory to look for configuration files.
By default this is set to ~/.config/.
${XDG_CONFIG_DIRS}
A colon separated list of base directories that contain
configuration data. By default the application will look in
${sysconfdir}/xdg/. The value of ${sysconfdir} depends on how the
program was build and will often be /etc/ for binary packages.
${XDG_DATA_HOME}
The root for all user-specific data files. By default
this is set to ~/.local/share/.
${XDG_DATA_DIRS}
A set of preference ordered base directories relative to
which data files should be searched in addition to the ${XDG_DATA_HOME}
base directory. The directories should be separated with a colon.