How to Install Terminus On Linux
Terminal emulators on Linux that use Electron aren’t a new thing. There’s Hyper Terminal and others. Though it might seem silly to make a terminal emulator with web technology, it actually isn’t. Using this technology allows developers to deliver the same, powerful terminal application across multiple platforms without a lot of heavy lifting. One of the best implementations for terminal applications on Linux that make heavy use out Electron is Terminus, a terminal emulator similar to Hyper but with more of a “getting things done” focus. If you’re interested in trying out Terminus on Linux, follow the instructions below to get going. Please note that you need to be running Ubuntu, Debian, Arch Linux, Fedora or OpenSUSE to install with a binary package.
SPOILER ALERT: Scroll down and watch the video tutorial at the end of this article.
Ubuntu/Debian
Installing Terminus on Ubuntu and Debian follows more or less the same process. This is because, though they are different operating systems, they share a common set of tools and packaging system. To start the installation, head over to the official download page for Terminus, and grab the latest Deb package.
Officially, the Terminus terminal developers don’t have any PPAs or Debian software repositories to speak of, so keep in mind that with each Terminus update, you’ll need to go to the release page and repeat the installation process outlined here.
After downloading the Debian package, open up the Linux file manager, click on “Downloads” and double-click on the Terminus DEB package. Clicking on the Debian package will automatically open up either Ubuntu Software Center on Ubuntu or the Gdebi package installation tool on Debian.
Click on the “Install” button to start the installation process, enter your password and wait for Terminus to install. Alternatively, open up a terminal and follow the instructions below to install via command-line.
cd ~/Downloads sudo dpkg -i terminus_*_amd64.deb sudo apt install -f
Arch Linux
Installing the Terminus terminal application on Arch Linux starts out by syncing the latest version of the Git tool with Pacman.
sudo pacman -S git
Now that Git is synced, use it to run a git clone, and download the latest snapshot of the Terminus AUR package to your Linux PC.
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/terminus.git
Using the CD command, move the terminal from the Home directory to the newly cloned terminus folder on your Arch computer.
cd terminus
At this point, it’s safe to start the package building process. Keep in mind that during this process, you may need to address dependency issues, as makepkg may not automatically fetch and install all needed libraries. If you see an error, followed by a message that a something isn’t found, go to the official Terminus AUR page, scroll down to find “dependencies” and install the missing one.
Build and install Terminus with:
makepkg -si
Fedora/OpenSUSE
Much like Debian and Ubuntu, Fedora and OpenSUSE have a native, installable package ready to go for Terminus. To install this package, first, head over to the Terminus download page. Look for “RPM”, and download the latest release.
After downloading the latest release, open up the Linux file manager, click on “Downloads” and double-click on the Terminus RPM file. Selecting the RPM should automatically open up Gnome Software, KDE Discover or another RPM installation program.
Click “Install”, enter your password and start the installation process. Alternatively, install Terminus via the command line:
cd ~/Downloads
Fedora
sudo dnf install terminus-*-alpha.47.rpm
OpenSUSE
sudo zypper install terminus-*-alpha.47.rpm
Please note that because Terminus doesn’t have a software repository, you’ll need to repeat this process to install updates.
Source Instructions
For those looking to use Terminus but unable to find a Linux binary file for their operating system, there is another way: the source code. To install, you’ll first need to download the latest release for Terminus. Head over to the release page, look for “terminus-1.0.0-alpha.47.tar.gz”, or something similar.
To be clear, this isn’t the raw program files in an unusable state. They are compiled, but we’ll refer to it as “source code”, as it’s not turned into a native package for installation. To get the full, code to compile, look at the bottom of the page.
Now that the latest Terminus tarball is downloaded, open up a terminal window and use the Tar command to fully extract the contents.
cd ~/Downloads
tar -xvzf terminus-*-alpha.47.tar.gz
mv terminus-1.0.0-alpha.47 ~/terminus
cd ~/terminus
The Terminus application is fully extracted from the Tar archive, renamed and moved to /home/username/. At this point, you’ll be able to create a Desktop shortcut. Create a new shortcut file with touch, then open the file with Nano.
touch ~/Desktop/terminus.desktop sudo chmod +x ~/Desktop/terminus.desktop sudo nano ~/Desktop/terminus.desktop
Paste the following code into the Terminus shortcut file:
[Desktop Entry]
Name=Terminus
Comment=A terminal for a modern age
Exec="/home/username/terminus/terminus"
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Icon=/home/username/terminus/terminus-icon.png
Categories=Utilities;
Save the file with Ctrl + O, and exit Nano using Ctrl + X.
Next, use the wget tool to download an icon for Terminus to use:
cd ~/terminus wget https://icons.iconarchive.com/icons/papirus-team/papirus-apps/512/terminus-icon.png
To launch the program, go to the desktop and click on the Terminus shortcut.
