The terminal control sequences that follow the ESC character are dependent on which terminal the control codes were generated for. Many terminal emulators support color and cursor control through a system of escape sequences. One such standard is commonly referred to as ANSI Color. Several terminal specifications are based on the ANSI color standard, including VT100.
<ESC> represents the ASCII "escape" character, 0x1B. Bracketed tags represent modifiable decimal parameters; eg. {ROW} would be replaced by a row number.
Device Status
The following codes are used for reporting terminal/display settings, and vary depending on the implementation:
Query Device Code <ESC>[c
- Requests a Report Device Code response from the device.
Report Device Code <ESC>[{code}0c
- Generated by the device in response to Query Device Code request.
Query Device Status <ESC>[5n
- Requests a Report Device Status response from the device.
Report Device OK <ESC>[0n
- Generated by the device in response to a Query Device Status request; indicates that device is functioning correctly.
Report Device Failure <ESC>[3n
- Generated by the device in response to a Query Device Status request; indicates that device is functioning improperly.
Query Cursor Position <ESC>[6n
- Requests a Report Cursor Position response from the device.
Report Cursor Position <ESC>[{ROW};{COLUMN}R
- Generated by the device in response to a Query Cursor Position request; reports current cursor position.
Terminal Setup
The h and l codes are used for setting terminal/display mode, and vary depending on the implementation. Line Wrap is one of the few setup codes that tend to be used consistently:
Reset Device <ESC>c
- Reset all terminal settings to default.
Enable Line Wrap <ESC>[7h
- Text wraps to next line if longer than the length of the display area.
Disable Line Wrap <ESC>[7l
- Disables line wrapping.
Fonts
Some terminals support multiple fonts: normal/bold, swiss/italic, etc. There are a variety of special codes for certain terminals; the following are fairly standard:
Font Set G0 <ESC>(
- Set default font.
Font Set G1 <ESC>)
- Set alternate font.
Cursor Control
Cursor Home <ESC>[{ROW};{COLUMN}H
- Sets the cursor position where subsequent text will begin. If no row/column parameters are provided (ie. <ESC>[H), the cursor will move to the home position, at the upper left of the screen.
Cursor Up <ESC>[{COUNT}A
- Moves the cursor up by COUNT rows; the default count is 1.
Cursor Down <ESC>[{COUNT}B
- Moves the cursor down by COUNT rows; the default count is 1.
Cursor Forward <ESC>[{COUNT}C
- Moves the cursor forward by COUNT columns; the default count is 1.
Cursor Backward <ESC>[{COUNT}D
- Moves the cursor backward by COUNT columns; the default count is 1.
Force Cursor Position <ESC>[{ROW};{COLUMN}f
- Identical to Cursor Home.
Save Cursor <ESC>[s
- Save current cursor position.
Unsave Cursor <ESC>[u
- Restores cursor position after a Save Cursor.
Save Cursor & Attrs <ESC>7
- Save current cursor position.
Restore Cursor & Attrs <ESC>8
- Restores cursor position after a Save Cursor.
Scrolling
Scroll Screen <ESC>[r
- Enable scrolling for entire display.
Scroll Screen <ESC>[{start};{end}r
- Enable scrolling from row {start} to row {end}.
Scroll Down <ESC>D
- Scroll display down one line.
Scroll Up <ESC>M
- Scroll display up one line.
Tab Control
Set Tab <ESC>H
- Sets a tab at the current position.
Clear Tab <ESC>[g
- Clears tab at the current position.
Clear All Tabs <ESC>[3g
- Clears all tabs.