Screen Buffer Size and overscrolling #171

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opened 2026-01-30 21:44:37 +00:00 by claunia · 0 comments
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Originally created by @jwatt on GitHub (Feb 26, 2018).

Originally assigned to: @zadjii-msft on GitHub.

One irritation with terminal apps on Windows is the concept of the Screen Buffer Size. Having this be a fixed value rather than dynamically growing, and particularly the fact that the scrollable length of the window is fixed to this value, makes these Windows apps feel really archaic and clunky having had experience of macOS/Linux/etc.

Personally the apps that I build produce a lot of build output, and I want to be able to scroll back/search through it on the occassions that I need to (without having to be slowed down by the need to up a separate log file). To do that I have to set the Screen Buffer Size to something large (9999). But then most times there's an ocean of blank are below the prompt! Swipe scrolling past the end of the visual output (and prompt) and having to scroll back gets tiresome real quick...

Originally created by @jwatt on GitHub (Feb 26, 2018). Originally assigned to: @zadjii-msft on GitHub. One irritation with terminal apps on Windows is the concept of the Screen Buffer Size. Having this be a fixed value rather than dynamically growing, and particularly the fact that the scrollable length of the window is fixed to this value, makes these Windows apps feel really archaic and clunky having had experience of macOS/Linux/etc. Personally the apps that I build produce a lot of build output, and I want to be able to scroll back/search through it on the occassions that I need to (without having to be slowed down by the need to up a separate log file). To do that I have to set the Screen Buffer Size to something large (9999). But then most times there's an ocean of blank are below the prompt! Swipe scrolling past the end of the visual output (and prompt) and having to scroll back gets tiresome real quick...
claunia added the Issue-FeatureProduct-ConhostResolution-Fix-AvailableArea-Output labels 2026-01-30 21:44:37 +00:00
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Reference: starred/terminal#171