CLI

 

I use terminals/command prompts occasionally, and they can be neat to work with from time to time. Unfortunately, the command prompt that’s built into Windows just isn’t very inspiring to use, so I’ve looked for alternatives.

Console2

I’ve seen this being used in a couple of Pluralsight courses. It provides multiple tabs, themes, and a lot of other nice stuff. It’s also free and open source. Scott Hanselman wrote a blog post about Console2 in 2011 where he highlighted it is as a better alternative to the built-in Windows command prompt.

It’s available at SourceForge.

ConEmu

I’ve used ConEmu for a while, and I’ve managed to configure it up quite nicely. I like the “Quake” mode where you can just press a keyboard combination and have the console window slide down from the top of the screen. Scott Hanselman who wrote about Console2 in 2011 decided to switch over to ConEmu in 2012, which he also wrote about in a blog post.

ConEmu is available here.

xterm.js

Xterm.js is a terminal front-end component written in JavaScript that works in the browser.

It enables applications to provide fully featured terminals to their users and create great development experiences.

Perhaps not a direct replacement for a Windows based terminal, but this one can run directly in the browser which is pretty cool.

Xterm.js is available here on GitHub.

… and more

Here’s a list of Windows command prompt alternatives with reviews.

Another blog post by Scott Hanselman (from 2013). This one listing multiple alternatives.