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Inside the Windows Console

blogs.msdn.microsoft.com

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Re: Inside the Windows Console

#41

Post by slededit »

zadjii wrote: post #14
gmueckl wrote: post #11

So they have been working on uograding this since 2014? So far, the visible results seem a bit underwhelming for the invested time and effort. How big is the team? What am I missing here?

Well, the team is small, we're up to three whole devs now. Since 2014 we've been doing a lot of work o help bring our VT implementation up to par (to help enable WSL), as well as implementing new features such as 256/RGB color support, improved accessibility features, and we're even releasing a pty-like API for Windows. Not only that, but since the team was founded we discovered that conhost was not the only console…

He can't say it publicly but the code behind the console is crap. Not just from a modern perspective looking back, the original devs hated it too. The book Show Stopper! Has some colorful words about it.

And since it's so core to the system and deeply intertwined you can't just go in and start arbitrarily changing things. Everyone has been too scared to touch it for the last 20 years.

This is painstaking careful work. I don't think throwing more people at it would really help too much.

My hat is off to you and your team for finally fixing this.

Re: Inside the Windows Console

#43

Post by sun41 »

zadjii wrote: post #10
flabbergast wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this 30 years old code-base.. besides it is questionable only dev's below 30yr old are working on it (age discrimination, or accidental?), hardly anything changed. If I want to copy something I still have to do the ancient mark and copy sequence from the right click menu! What are they working on then? Still fixing bugs?

Have you tried enabling QuickEdit mode in the Properties (right click on the titlebar)? Quick edit lets you use the mouse for selecting, and in Insider's releases we've even added support for Ctrl+Shift+C/V for copy paste (even in wsl!). We've been working on not only tons of bugs, but adding plenty of new features, including support for VT sequences, 256/RGB color, improving our unicode support, enhanced accessibili…

> and in Insider's releases we've even added support for Ctrl+Shift+C/V for copy paste (even in wsl!)

Insider's release only? Wow, that sounds like really advanced stuff for something totally basic!

> we've even added support for Ctrl+Shift+C/V for copy paste

So, you're from Microsoft, down voting everything that has the slightest touch of criticism? With the entire team maybe? You must be a very proud employee.

Re: Inside the Windows Console

#45

Post by izacus »

threeseed wrote: post #37
komali2 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you able to speak at all to the labor assignment? Microsoft is big, why only put 3 engineers on this project?

This is bizarre to me. You simply can not attract developers to your platform without a first rate console experience. Why even bother with Powershell, Linux Subsystem etc without getting this crucial component working perfectly ?

Windows is the biggest, most popular development platform in the world.

Are you not even slightly aware of the bias and bubble you live in?!

Re: Inside the Windows Console

#47

Post by sun41 »

zadjii wrote: post #8
thomastjeffery wrote: post #2

> The Windows Console code-base is currently (July 2018) almost 30 years old ... older, in fact, than the developers who now work on it! Which really shows, especially since you still can't use a TTF-font without editing the registry .

That's just flat out wrong: https://i.imgur.com/ae1yyXI.png We added support for TTF fonts a few releases ago.

Wow, so that's fixed after almost 30 years! Flat out amazing, what a team!

Re: Inside the Windows Console

#48

Post by russellbeattie »

zadjii wrote: post #14
gmueckl wrote: post #11

So they have been working on uograding this since 2014? So far, the visible results seem a bit underwhelming for the invested time and effort. How big is the team? What am I missing here?

Well, the team is small, we're up to three whole devs now. Since 2014 we've been doing a lot of work o help bring our VT implementation up to par (to help enable WSL), as well as implementing new features such as 256/RGB color support, improved accessibility features, and we're even releasing a pty-like API for Windows. Not only that, but since the team was founded we discovered that conhost was not the only console…

I don't use Windows mostly because the console experience is so bad. I'm sure there are many others like me. Your superiors should realize they have lost generations of developers because of this and dedicate the resources needed to fix it. How they haven't realized this yet, astounds me.

Re: Inside the Windows Console

#49

Post by atr2 »

russellbeattie wrote: post #48
zadjii wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the team is small, we're up to three whole devs now. Since 2014 we've been doing a lot of work o help bring our VT implementation up to par (to help enable WSL), as well as implementing new features such as 256/RGB color support, improved accessibility features, and we're even releasing a pty-like API for Windows. Not only that, but since the team was founded we discovered that conhost was not the only console…

I don't use Windows mostly because the console experience is so bad. I'm sure there are many others like me. Your superiors should realize they have lost generations of developers because of this and dedicate the resources needed to fix it. How they haven't realized this yet, astounds me.

Use mintty (or wsltty for WSL). It's slow but it's good.

The Windows console really is rubbish, even after all these updates; don't bother with it.

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