Terminal app that uses the entire terminal window

Question

I've seen terminal apps, such as vim, that when used fill the whole screen and then disappear entirely when they are quit, i.e. they do not simply print into the current terminal "space":

Vim, when opened, takes up the whole terminal window, and when closed prints nothing else in the terminal.

I was wondering how in C# I can accomplish this.

score 0 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 10:27

0

The program uses the alternate screen feature of the terminal (originally xterm, but others).

vim is using the terminal description, which includes escape sequences for starting and ending the use of cursor-addressing. Mostly (for xterm and imitators) that switches to/from the alternate screen, saving/restoring the cursor position in the normal screen. Not all terminal descriptions use the feature.

A history of the feature is given in the xterm FAQ Why doesn't the screen clear when running vi?. Originally this was (in terminfo format)

smcup=\E7\E[?47h, rmcup=\E[2J\E[?47l\E8,

(where \E is the ASCII escape character \033), and the modern version is

smcup=\E7\E[?1049h, rmcup=\E[?1049l

Referring to MSDN, this probably will work for \E7\E[?47h:

System.Console.Write("\u001b7\u001b[?47h")

The \E becomes \u001b. Similarly, for \E[2J\E[?47l\E8, you could write

System.Console.Write("\u001b[2J\u001b[?47l\u001b8")

Further reading:

edited May 23 '17 at 10:27

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answered Oct 02 '16 at 19:19

Thomas Dickey

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And how can I use the alternate screen in C#? – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 19:20
What is the escape sequence? You do not mention it. – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 19:22
I see you've edited your answer to include what the escape sequences are, but how do I actually use C# to "print" them to the console? – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 20:02
I get "error CS1009: Unrecognized escape sequence '\E'" when i try `System.Console.Write("\E7\E[?47h")` – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 20:03
try `System.Console.Write("\0337\033[?47h")` – Thomas Dickey Oct 02 '16 at 20:04
That literally prints "33733[?47h" – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 20:04
What about rmcup? I tried looking through your link ([MSDN](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms228362.aspx)) but couldn't find any references. – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 20:46
Why aren't you using what you called "the modern" version? – theonlygusti Oct 02 '16 at 20:49
because you asked about the older one where you commented about "error CS1009:" – Thomas Dickey Oct 02 '16 at 21:02

Terminal app that uses the entire terminal window

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