How does a terminal emulator work? What are ANSI escape codes? Understanding terminal internals for development, fun and mischief.

The blog post “Anatomy of a Terminal Emulator” on poor.dev provides a broad introduction to terminal emulators, focusing on their components and interactions. It explains the role of the terminal emulator in interpreting data from the shell and displaying it, often using ANSI escape codes for formatting. The post describes the connection between the terminal emulator and the shell through a pseudoterminal (pty), detailing how input and output are handled. It includes Rust code examples to demonstrate these concepts, making it accessible to both new and experienced developers. Additionally, it discusses creating user interfaces in the terminal and touches on responsive design using the SIGWINCH signal.

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