Microsoft's Last Major Windows Terminal Preview: Azure Cloud Shell, Settings Updates

Microsoft's team behind Windows Terminal has released version 0.11 of the open-source command-line tool for developers who use Command Prompt, PowerShell, and the Windows 10 Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). 

This version will be the "last major update before the 1.0 release of Windows Terminal", according to Microsoft, however there may be new releases between now and that milestone that will be revisions of this version. 

Microsoft is targeting a May release for Terminal 1.0, a year after Terminal was announced at Microsoft Build 2019 developer conference. 

Of course, Build 2020, scheduled for May 19-21 in Seattle, will be an online-only event due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. Build usually attracts around 5,000 developers. 

Terminal users can download the new version from the Microsoft Store or from the GitHub releases page. 

Terminal v0.11 is the first version that supports a non-English UI language, but Microsoft is still ironing out bugs and translation issues. 

Terminal's connection to Azure Cloud Shell, Microsoft's browser-based shell for managing Azure resources, should now be more robust when confronted with errors and expired tokens. 

"When there's an error, we'll actually tell you what it is instead of blaming your ISP," said Dustin L Howett, a Microsoft engineering lead. The same goes for errors when a user's token has expired. Now Terminal will make the user log in again. 

There are also significant changes to settings. For example, profiles.json has been renamed to settings.json. For users with Terminal installed, Terminal will automatically update the user's file name.   

Microsoft recommends that users move their settings file out of the folder and let Terminal automatically generate a new one. After that, users can copy their settings back over.

Cascadia Code, the typeface Microsoft developed for Terminal, is now the default for all profiles automatically generated by the Terminal. 

Terminal also now ships with the Tango Dark and Tango Light color schemes by default and users can specify a cursor color in a color scheme instead of the user profiles. Additionally, the default background color for the legacy Windows PowerShell profile is now black. 

There are several input and interaction updates, including the touch keyboard now appearing when users click the terminal, as well as improvements to touchpad and touchscreen scrolling. Emoji and kaomoji should also appear during composition. 

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