ls command response encoding issues

[PlugNPush]

Most of my files and folder are not properly formatted when running ls or ls -artl with strange squares and [01;34m at the beginning of folder or file names, and squares and [0m at the end. Did I miss a configuration somewhere? Running on PowerShell 7.6.1 (x64).

[lhecker]

What terminal and Windows version are you using? Are you using the old console window and got the legacy console enabled in its settings? VT support is a requirement.

[PlugNPush]

Windows 11 and "PowerShell 7 (x64)"

[lhecker]

To get the Windows version run the winver command.
And regarding PowerShell: That's just the name of the shell (runs commands). The terminal is the window around it (renders the output). 😅 What are you using for that? The old classic console Window?

[jbauerrfid]

It appears that some older versions of Windows 11 don't decode the color coding properly.

When running ls -la --color=auto on some Windows boxes I see the strange characters instead of applying colors properly.

[PlugNPush]

winver => Windows 11 23H2 build 22631.2428

As for the terminal window, I do not know. I open it by opening the PowerShell 7 (x64) program and that is also the window title.

I do not have the new Windows Terminal installed because it requires access to the MS Store.

[caomengxuan666]

This looks like a VT/ANSI console-mode issue rather than a PowerShell wrapper issue.

The wrapper makes it easier to hit because bare ls becomes ls.cmd --color=auto, but the same should happen with an explicit ls --color=auto.

The [01;34m / [0m text means ANSI color codes are being printed, but the console is not interpreting them. I noticed main.rs sets the output code page to UTF-8, but does not enable ENABLE_VIRTUAL_TERMINAL_PROCESSING.

For reference, WinuxCmd handles this during startup:

• startup calls setupConsoleForUnicode():
  https://github.com/caomengxuan666/WinuxCmd/blob/main/src/Main/main.cpp#L624
• that helper enables ENABLE_VIRTUAL_TERMINAL_PROCESSING when stdout is a console:
  https://github.com/caomengxuan666/WinuxCmd/blob/main/src/utils/console.cppm#L207-L233

Maybe coreutils could do something similar for classic Windows Console Host, and fall back to no color only if enabling VT fails. In my experience, enabling VT at startup is the least surprising behavior for Windows-native command-line tools that emit ANSI colors.

[lhecker]

Correct, it needs ENABLE_VIRTUAL_TERMINAL_PROCESSING.