4.8 KiB
author | created on | last updated |
---|---|---|
Mike Griese @zadjii-msft | 2020-01-16 | 2020-01-17 |
Using the wt.exe
Commandline
As of #4023, the Windows Terminal now supports accepting arguments on the
commandline, to enable launching the Terminal in a non-default configuration.
This document serves as a reference for all the parameters you can currently
pass, and gives some examples of how to use the wt
commandline.
NOTE: If you're running the Terminal built straight from the repo, you'll need to use
wtd.exe
andwtd
instead ofwt.exe
andwt
.
Reference
Options
--help,-h,-?,/?,
Display the help message.
Subcommands
new-tab
new-tab [terminal_parameters]
Opens a new tab with the given customizations. On its first invocation, also
opens a new window. Subsequent new-tab
commands will all open new tabs in the
same window.
Parameters:
[terminal_parameters]
: See [terminal_parameters].
split-pane
split-pane [--target,-t target-pane] [-H]|[-V] [terminal_parameters]
Creates a new pane in the currently focused tab by splitting the given pane vertically or horizontally.
Parameters:
--target,-t target-pane
: Creates a new split in the giventarget-pane
. Each pane has a unique index (per-tab) which can be used to identify them. These indicies are assigned in the order the panes were created. If omitted, defaults to the index of the currently focused pane.-H
,-V
: Used to indicate which direction to split the pane.-V
is "vertically" (think[|]
), and-H
is "horizontally" (think[-]
). If omitted, defaults to "auto", which splits the current pane in whatever the larger dimension is. If both-H
and-V
are provided, defaults to vertical.[terminal_parameters]
: See [terminal_parameters].
focus-tab
focus-tab [--target,-t tab-index]|[--next,-n]|[--previous,-p]
Moves focus to a given tab.
Parameters:
--target,-t tab-index
: moves focus to the tab at indextab-index
. If omitted, defaults to0
(the first tab). Will display an error if combined with either of--next
or--previous
.-n,--next
: Move focus to the next tab. Will display an error if combined with either of--previous
or--target
.-p,--previous
: Move focus to the previous tab. Will display an error if combined with either of--next
or--target
.
[terminal_parameters]
Some of the preceding commands are used to create a new terminal instance.
These commands are listed above as accepting [terminal_parameters]
as a
parameter. For these commands, [terminal_parameters]
can be any of the
following:
[--profile,-p profile-name] [--startingDirectory,-d starting-directory] [commandline]
--profile,-p profile-name
: Use the given profile to open the new tab/pane, whereprofile-name
is thename
orguid
of a profile. Ifprofile-name
does not match any profiles, uses the default.--startingDirectory,-d starting-directory
: Overrides the value ofstartingDirectory
of the specified profile, to start instarting-directory
instead.commandline
: A commandline to replace the default commandline of the selected profile. If the user wants to use a;
in this commandline, it should be escaped as\;
.
Examples
Open Windows Terminal in the current directory
wt -d .
This will launch a new Windows Terminal window in the current working directory.
It will use your default profile, but instead of using the startingDirectory
property from that it will use the current path. This is especially useful for
launching the Windows Terminal in a directory you currently have open in an
explorer.exe
window.
Opening with multiple panes
If you want to open with multiple panes in the same tab all at once, you can use
the split-pane
command to create new panes.
Consider the following commandline:
wt ; split-pane -p "Windows PowerShell" ; split-pane -H wsl.exe
This creates a new Windows Terminal window with one tab, and 3 panes:
wt
: Creates the new tab with the default profilesplit-pane -p "Windows PowerShell"
: This will create a new pane, split from the parent with the default profile. This pane will open with the "Windows PowerShell" profilesplit-pane -H wsl.exe
: This will create a third pane, slit horizontally from the "Windows PowerShell" pane. It will be running the default profile, and will usewsl.exe
as the commandline (instead of the default profile'scommandline
).