5 ms·

> Windows Terminal is a console Terminal emulator :) "Console" can have a multitude of different meanings.

• mehrdadn 7y ago
  What are the other meanings that could work here?
  • laumars 7y ago
    Console's can be hardware (physical switches et al) as well as web based (AWS Console). "console" is also often used interchangeably with different layers of the stack such as the device you directly interface with (terminal emulator, physical console, etc), the transmission medium (eg RS232, sshd, etc), nor any of the console software stack (pseudo-TTYs et al). Console is a generic term for the management concept whereas "terminal emulator" is a specific term for a software application used to launch a command line.
• dgellow 7y ago
  Sure. While technically correct that’s also confusing to anyone who doesn’t know what a terminal was/is, and why it has to be emulated! The entire terminology is a mess :p
  • laumars 7y ago
    I agree but it is what it is. The world is full of terminology that are steeped in legacy and sometimes don't even mean what the words literally describe. Why is a save icon a blue and grey box? What discs are those DJs spinning on their MBPs? Why do people hoover with their Dysons and Google in Bing? Why is fibre internet called "broadband" when fibre optics operate on a narrowband? Human languages are a clusterfuck at times.
• JdeBP 7y ago
  ... but the one that clearly applies is the one that has been in use in the world of Microsoft Windows for nigh on 30 years. (-:
  • laumars 7y ago
    Not really. Microsoft actually borrowed that term from elsewhere (the term has existed longer than Microsoft have existed).
    • JdeBP 7y ago
      The word has. The specific meaning has not. That's a thing that Microsoft invented, after all. (Microsoft was even in on the inventions of its several clear precursors, for which the name "console" hadn't yet been ascribed, such as the VIO/KBD/MOU subsystems in OS/2 1.x.) Windows Terminal most definitiely uses consoles, with the aforementioned meaning.
      • laumars 7y ago
        Microsoft didn't invent consoles. They have also been around longer than Microsoft have existed. The distinction you're making here is pretty tenuous and irrelevant to the original question being asked since we're talking about the terminal GUI not the console guts; and the fact that Microsoft even call this product "Windows Terminal" should make this an open and shut case.
        • JdeBP 7y ago
          Microsoft did invent this particular I/O abstraction, named a console. And it's only irrelevant if you disagreeing with "Windows Terminal is a console" is irrelevant. Were you irrelevant? (-: Windows Terminal is built on top of the console I/O mechanism. It talks to consoles, as do the 1990s and later Win32 console applications that one can run displayed within Windows Terminal. Arguing with someone who says that "Windows Terminal is a console", as you did, based upon the product name is fairly flawed. The name for this I/O abstraction, invented by Microsoft for Windows NT and evolved from earlier operating systems, is a console. If you want open and shut, by the way, one of the programs that is the innards of Windows Terminal is named OpenConsole.exe . It provides an enhanced implementation of the console I/O server, formerly conhost, and before that formerly CSRSS.