VTE

I recently had the opportunity to test out the VTE library and I must say, it's quite impressive. For those unfamiliar, VTE is a research project that aims to answer the question: "If programs can use a termcap file to determine how to drive a terminal, why can't a terminal emulator use a termcap file to determine how to behave?" After some investigating, it seems the answer is due to curses having more detailed information than termcap, but this did not stop VTE from implementing a terminal emulator widget for GTK+ 2.2/2.4.

The VTE library, or libvte as it is commonly referred to, includes a wrapper application (vte) that is housed in a GTK window. While all settings are hard-coded to whatever was needed for testing, the library still works well in practice. However, for those who need more in-depth functionality, I would recommend using the gnome-terminal instead.

So, how does it work? The VTE library inserts terminal capability strings into a tree of tables, which allows it to determine if incoming data is a control sequence or just random data. The sample program "interpret" can give you a better understanding of what the widget sees after it filters incoming data.

All in all, I would highly recommend giving the VTE library a try. It is well-designed, efficient, and functions as intended.