How to set up the rxvt terminal for Cygwin

By On May 19, 2011 · 3 Comments

Download and run the Cygwin setup file.

Select Install from Internet.

Enter C:\cygwin as the Root Directory.

When you get to the package list, search for rxvt and click the word skip so that it changes to a version number.

Add any other packages you want. I always install at least these:

  • git
  • git-completion
  • git-gui
  • git-svn
  • gitk
  • openssh
  • rsync
  • rxvt
  • screen
  • tig
  • unzip
  • vim
  • wget

Create a new file called C:\cygwin\rxvt.bat and add these contents.

Replace “Craig” with your user name. If you don’t like large fonts or Lucida Console, you can change that as well.

Create a desktop shortcut to C:\cygwin\rxvt.bat and change its icon to C:\cygwin\bin\rxvt.exe.

The default colors aren’t that great. You can copy my .bashrc, .dircolors, and .Xdefaults from my dotfiles github repository or you can create your own.

 
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  • Oleksandr Gavenko

    Rxvt is old approach under Cygwin.

    Now day ‘mintty’ is preferred solution for terminal emulator under Cygwin (same as ‘rxvt’ don’t require X server).

    Look to my http://trac-hg.assembla.com/gavenkoa-skel/browser/.minttyrc for basic config.

    • http://motlin.com Craig P. Motlin

      Good advice. Thanks!

      I cut down the configuration somewhat and pushed it.
      https://github.com/motlin/dotfiles/blob/desktop/.minttyrc

      The only thing I couldn’t figure out right away is how to get rid of the scrollbar on the right.

      • http://motlin.com Craig P. Motlin

        I took a guess and tried Scrollbar=false and that worked. Very nice!