danterm

A macOS terminal built on ghostty with the behavior I want.

Install

Download the latest .dmg from Releases.

Nix (home-manager)

# flake.nix
{
  inputs = {
    nixpkgs.url = "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/nixpkgs-unstable";
    home-manager.url = "github:nix-community/home-manager";
    danterm.url = "github:danneu/danterm";
  };

  outputs = { nixpkgs, home-manager, danterm, ... }: {
    homeConfigurations."myuser" = home-manager.lib.homeManagerConfiguration {
      pkgs = nixpkgs.legacyPackages.aarch64-darwin;
      modules = [
        danterm.homeManagerModules.default
        {
          programs.danterm.enable = true;
        }
      ];
    };
  };
}

Usage

Like any other terminal, you probably want to grant DanTerm.app these macOS permissions:

• Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Full Disk Access
• Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Developer Tools

Non-negotiable features:

• Vertical tab sidebar
• Split panes
• Creating a tab/pane should use the cwd of the previous pane
• Highly visible terminal bell that remains until dismissed
• Notifications from panes toggle the originating pane when clicked

Bonus features:

• Tabs can be grouped into collapsible sections
• Lightweight: Built with AppKit (Swift) on top of ghostty (zig)
• Launch terminal with specific layout/tabs/panes/commands: --init <model.json>
• Dump and restore danterm state from a json file
• Restore danterm state if it detects non-graceful exit

General terminal features

• Cmd-click to open URL and file paths
  • Cmd-shift-click needed if program is capturing mouse events (vim, tmux, etc). The shift modifier tells ghostty the click is for you, not the program.

Claude Code Integration

For some reason, Claude Code seems to wait 1-2 minutes before sending an OSC 777 / OSC 9 notification when it's waiting for a response.

To work around this, create a script (e.g. ~/.claude/hooks/claude-notify.sh):

(Must have jq installed)

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Extracts Claude's last message and sends an OSC 777 notification.
MSG=$(cat | jq -r '.last_assistant_message // empty' | head -c 200)
printf '\e]777;notify;Claude Code;%s\a' "${MSG:-Claude finished responding}" > /dev/tty

Then add a Stop hook to your Claude Code settings (~/.claude/settings.json):

{
  "hooks": {
    "Stop": [
      {
        "hooks": [
          {
            "type": "command",
            "command": "~/.claude/hooks/claude-notify.sh",
            "timeout": 10
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
}

DanTerm turns OSC 777 and OSC 9 messages into a macOS notification that, when clicked, will take you to the originating pane.

OpenAI Codex Integration

Codex already works out of the box. Dunno what's wrong with Claude Code.

Shell Integration

DanTerm can export its state or load from a state file.

This state includes the tab groups, tabs, pane layout, cwd of each pane, and (once you opt in) the command running in each pane.

Add the snippet for your shell to opt in. It's zero-cost when not running inside DanTerm.

Zsh (~/.zshrc)

# Restore scrollback from previous DanTerm session
if [[ -n "$DANTERM_RESTORE_SCROLLBACK_FILE" ]]; then
  _danterm_sbf="$DANTERM_RESTORE_SCROLLBACK_FILE"
  unset DANTERM_RESTORE_SCROLLBACK_FILE
  if [[ -r "$_danterm_sbf" ]]; then
    /bin/cat -- "$_danterm_sbf" 2>/dev/null || true
    /bin/rm -f -- "$_danterm_sbf" >/dev/null 2>&1 || true
  fi
  unset _danterm_sbf
fi

# Report current command to DanTerm.app
if [[ -n "$DANTERM_TOKEN" ]]; then
  typeset -g _danterm_tok="$DANTERM_TOKEN"
  unset DANTERM_TOKEN
  _danterm_b64() { printf '%s' "$1" | base64 | tr -d '\n'; }
  _danterm_preexec() {
    printf '\e]0;__DANTERM_EVT__:%s:CMD_START:%s\a' "$_danterm_tok" "$(_danterm_b64 "$1")"
    printf '\e]0;%s\a' "$1"
  }
  _danterm_precmd() {
    printf '\e]0;__DANTERM_EVT__:%s:CMD_END\a' "$_danterm_tok"
    printf '\e]0;%s\a' "${(%):-%(4~|…/%3~|%~)}"
  }
  preexec_functions+=(_danterm_preexec)
  precmd_functions+=(_danterm_precmd)
fi

Fish (~/.config/fish/config.fish)

# Restore scrollback from previous DanTerm session
if set -q DANTERM_RESTORE_SCROLLBACK_FILE
  set -l f $DANTERM_RESTORE_SCROLLBACK_FILE
  set -e DANTERM_RESTORE_SCROLLBACK_FILE
  if test -r "$f"
    /bin/cat -- "$f" 2>/dev/null; or true
    /bin/rm -f -- "$f" >/dev/null 2>&1; or true
  end
end

# Report current command to DanTerm.app
if set -q DANTERM_TOKEN
  set -g _danterm_tok $DANTERM_TOKEN
  set -e DANTERM_TOKEN
  function __danterm_preexec --on-event fish_preexec
    set -l b64 (printf '%s' $argv[1] | base64 | string replace -a '\n' '')
    printf '\e]0;__DANTERM_EVT__:%s:CMD_START:%s\a' $_danterm_tok $b64
    printf '\e]0;%s\a' $argv[1]
  end
  function __danterm_postcmd --on-event fish_prompt
    printf '\e]0;__DANTERM_EVT__:%s:CMD_END\a' $_danterm_tok
    printf '\e]0;%s\a' (prompt_pwd)
  end
end

Keybinds

Action	Shortcut
New Tab	⌘T
Next Tab	⇧⌘N
Previous Tab	⇧⌘P
Close Pane	⌘W
Split Pane Right	⌘D
Split Pane Down	⇧⌘D
Focus Pane Left	⇧⌘H
Focus Pane Down	⇧⌘J
Focus Pane Up	⇧⌘K
Focus Pane Right	⇧⌘L
Toggle Pane Zoom	⌘Enter
New Group	⌘N
Go to Most Recent Unread Alert	⇧⌘A
Quit	⌘Q

Comparison

Feature	DanTerm	cmux	iTerm2	Kitty	WezTerm
Vertical tabs	Yes	Yes	Yes	--	--
Tab groups	Yes	Yes	--	--	--
Fast	Yes	Yes	--	Yes	Yes
Dan	Yes	--	--	--	--

iTerm2

iTerm was my go-to macOS terminal for 10+ years, but I've been having enough random issues with it that I figured it would be less of a setback to build my own.

e.g. Copy (cmd-c) was unreliable and notifications never seemed to properly focus the originating pane when using the global hotkey window.

Kitty/WezTerm

I tried these after iTerm, but they have really bad tab systems. I want something more first class and polished, like browser tabs.

cmux

Cmux is really good: https://github.com/manaflow-ai/cmux

But it's more complicated than I'd like since it includes a browser, and its panes can contain tabs.