pyxterm.js

A fully functional terminal in your browser.

How does this work?

On the backend:

A Flask server is running

The Flask server uses flask-socketio, a websocket library for Flask and socketio

A pty ("pseudo-terminal") is spawned that runs bash.
- You can think of a pty as a way to serialize/deserialize a terminal session. The Python docs describe it as "starting another process and being able to write to and read from its controlling terminal programmatically".

On the frontend:

Xterm.js is used to render Xterm output data in the browser.
- This means escape codes used by terminals to control the cursor location, color, and other options can be passed directly to Xterm.js and Xterm.js will faithfully render them as a terminal would.
- Output from the pty process on the backend is fed into it.
- Input from the browser is passed via websocket to the pty's input

Why?

The real purpose of this is to show a basic proof of concept on how to bring Xterm.js, Python, Flask, and Websockets together to run a pty in the browser.

This is a

starting point to build your own web app with a terminal

learning tool to understand what a pty is, and how to use one in Python

way to see Flask and Flask-SocketIO in action

way to play around with Xterm.js in a meaningful environment

Installation

There are a few ways to install and run.

Clone & Run Locally

Clone this repository, enter the pyxtermjs directory.

If you have nox you can run the following.

> nox -s run

Nox takes care of setting up a virtual environment and running the right command for you. You can pass arguments to the server like this

> nox -s run -- --debug

If you don't have nox, you can run the following from inside a virtual environment.

> pip install -r requirements.txt

> python -m pyxtermjs

> python -m pyxtermjs --debug

Install

You can install with pipx (recommended) or pip.

> pipx install pyxtermjs

> pyxtermjs

Or you can try run latest version on PyPI

> pipx run pyxtermjs

API

> pyxtermjs --help

usage: pyxtermjs [-h] [-p PORT] [--host HOST] [--debug] [--version]

                 [--command COMMAND] [--cmd-args CMD_ARGS]



A fully functional terminal in your browser.

https://github.com/cs01/pyxterm.js



optional arguments:

  -h, --help            show this help message and exit

  -p PORT, --port PORT  port to run server on (default: 5000)

  --host HOST           host to run server on (use 0.0.0.0 to allow access

                        from other hosts) (default: 127.0.0.1)

  --debug               debug the server (default: False)

  --version             print version and exit (default: False)

  --command COMMAND     Command to run in the terminal (default: bash)

  --cmd-args CMD_ARGS   arguments to pass to command (i.e. --cmd-args='arg1

                        arg2 --flag') (default: )

pyxtermjsA fully functional terminal in your browser.