If you are a coding geek you probably deal with command line interface on a daily basis. If that’s the case then why not customizing it? I have set a retro styled terminal with animated background. Let’s continue to know how.
The default command line or Windows PowerShell is not much customizable but you can install a Microsoft developed software called Windows Terminal Preview to customize all terminal profiles in your Windows operating system. You can find this app in the Microsoft Store to install. Open it and click the down icon to see Settings or hit ctrl + , to open the setting.
Open Settings > Defaults > Appearance to see a list of visual terminal settings. If you want to have a retro styled terminal, install and choose GohuFont 14 Nerd Font Mono as font face. Also enable Retro terminal effects. Lastly, use your custom image as background and select the desired Background image stretch mode plus Background image opacity. Fill and 60% are a good value for these two settings, respectively. Do not forget to save the changes.
You can use animated gif images as background. You can find high resolution animated gif images everywhere on the internet. deviantart.com is a good source for such images.
If you have already tested the result, you might have noticed that the default Color scheme values are not perfectly matched with retro terminal effects. Go to Settings > Color schemes > Add new to set a custom color scheme. You can select your color scheme in the Appearance.
Below you can find a sample color scheme that fits well with retro terminal effects. Notice that there is a JSON file available for all the Windows Terminal Preview settings. Click on the last tab Settings > Open JSON file to view and edit it. You can assign colors either manually or by settings.json file.
Below you can see my version of customized terminal. Yours should be somewhat similar:
Conclusion
We installed Microsoft Windows Terminal Preview and added a color scheme, selected an animated gif background, installed and used gohu font face and activated retro terminal effects. However there are a lot of settings for customization. you can as well add new terminal profiles such as PowerShell or activate WSL on windows.