thomasandClaude Opus 4.8
13608269b3
The persistent daemon (`tty7.exe --daemon`) is a detached background process
that outlives the GUI and is the running image of tty7.exe, so Windows locks
the file. An upgrade or uninstall then can't overwrite/remove the binary and
fails ("file in use" / reboot required) — the Restart Manager doesn't reliably
catch a no-window, DETACHED_PROCESS daemon in its own process group.
- spawn: extract the "stop the running daemon" half of `restart()` into a
reusable `stop()` (Shutdown -> await exit -> pid reap fallback -> clear
endpoint); `restart()` is now `stop()` + `ensure_running()`.
- main: add a `--stop-daemon` CLI entry that runs `stop()` and returns before
any GUI init, so it never opens a window.
- installer: in PrepareToInstall, extract the *new* tty7.exe to {tmp} and run
`--stop-daemon` (the new binary understands the flag; an old installed one
would launch the GUI instead), releasing the lock before file copy. Mirror it
in [UninstallRun]. Keep CloseApplications as a backstop but RestartApplications=no
(the GUI respawns the daemon on next start).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
tty7
A GPU-rendered terminal in pure Rust.
GPU rendering on Zed's gpui · VT core from Alacritty
Why tty7 · Install · Features · Benchmarks · Keybindings
English · 简体中文
Why tty7
- Fast — about 2× the throughput of Alacritty, Ghostty, or Kitty on the same hardware (benchmarks)
- A modern prompt — completion, syntax highlighting, and history search built in; no plugins to assemble
- Sessions that survive — close the window or quit the app, your shells keep running; no tmux
- Zero config — zsh, bash, fish, and PowerShell work out of the box
Native builds for macOS, Windows, and Linux ship with every release.
Install
Download the build for your platform from Releases:
- macOS —
tty7-<version>-macos-arm64.dmg(Apple Silicon) or…-x86_64.dmg(Intel); open it and dragtty7.appinto Applications. - Windows —
…-windows-x86_64-setup.exe(installer: Start Menu shortcut + uninstall entry), or…-windows-x86_64.zip(portable: unzip and runtty7.exe). - Linux —
…-linux-x86_64.AppImage(recommended: bundles the x11/wayland libraries, so it runs on Fedora / Arch / etc. with no extra packages —chmod +xand run), or…-linux-x86_64.tar.gz(bare binary; extract and run./tty7, needs the usual x11/wayland runtime libraries installed).
Features
At the prompt
- Ghost suggestions — your history completes the whole line as you type; → to accept
- Tab completion that explains — every flag and subcommand with its description, for ~100 common commands
- Syntax highlighting — as you type, nothing to install
- Fuzzy history search — ⌃ R shows what you ran, where, and whether it failed
- History from day one — your existing shell history just works, and carries across sessions
- Real line editing — selection, word motion, undo
In the window
- Tabs & splits — always open in the current directory
- Command palette ⌘ P · scrollback search ⌘ F
- ⌘-click links · desktop notifications
- Eight themes · CJK / IME input
Benchmarks
All four terminals measured back-to-back on the same machine, same day, same 155×40 grid — Apple M1 Pro, macOS 26.3.1, five-run averages (2026-07-04):
| tty7 | Alacritty | Ghostty | Kitty | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Plaintext IO — 11 MB cat (lower = better) |
95 ms | 239 ms | 179 ms | 185 ms |
| DOOM-fire frame rate (higher = better) | 888 fps | 485 fps | 552 fps | 617 fps |
| Cold-launch memory | 116 MB¹ | 105 MB | 128 MB | 130 MB |
¹ GUI 105 MB + the persistent daemon 11 MB.
Where the speed comes from:
- The PTY is read at device speed and parsed in large batches, off the render path
- Hot paths are lock-free — a big
catnever waits on drawing - The daemon buffers up to 16 MiB ahead of the window before backpressure applies
Methodology (how each terminal is driven, grid fairness, known pitfalls) and
one-command reproduction live in scripts/bench/ —
run it yourself.
Keybindings
Keys are shown in macOS notation — on Windows and Linux, read ⌘ as Ctrl. Open Settings with ⌘ , to browse or remap them all. The essentials:
| ⌘ T · ⌘ W · ⌘ ⇧ T | new tab · close tab · reopen closed tab |
| ⌘ 1…⌘ 9 · ⌃ ⇥ · ⌃ ⇧ ⇥ | jump to tab 1–9 · next tab · previous tab |
| ⌘ D · ⌘ ⇧ D | split right · split down |
| ⌘ ] · ⌘ [ | next pane · previous pane |
| ⌘ ⌥ ←→↑↓ | focus the pane in that direction |
| ⌘ ⏎ · ⌘ ⇧ ⏎ | toggle fullscreen · maximize / restore the pane |
| ⌘ K | clear the screen and scrollback |
| ⌘ P | command palette |
| ⌘ F | search the scrollback |
| ⌃ R | fuzzy-search shell history |
| ⌘ + · ⌘ − · ⌘ 0 | font size up · down · reset |
Settings → Keybindings lists every shortcut. Click one, press the new keys
(Esc cancels, Backspace resets to default), and it takes
effect immediately. Pane resize and swap have no default keys — bind them here or
run them from the command palette. Prefer tmux muscle memory? Flip the tmux
preset to remap pane/tab actions onto a prefix (default ⌃ B): ⌃ B
C opens a tab, ⌃ B % splits, ⌃ B then an
arrow moves focus. A bare prefix reaches the shell after a brief pause, and
prefix + an unbound key is passed straight through to the terminal.
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