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4. Configurable options
Configurable options are configurable via the preferences dialogue, which can be invoked by selecting Preferences menu item in the Settings menu.
4.1. General options
While most options are self-explanatory, some are discussed below in more detail.
- Terminal Class
Sets the terminal class for the current configuration or terminal. Refer to the section on classes for further information.
- Use --login by default
If this option is selected, GNOME Terminal will launch the shell in login mode (it will run all of your login initialization scripts in this mode). See also information about --login and --nologin command line options.
- Select-by-word characters
Defines a list of characters (or character classes) that should be considered 'word characters'. These are used when selecting text by word.
4.2. Background image configuration
In the Image tab, you can set the background image to use for the terminal. Possible choices are
None — in this case, GNOME Terminal will use the background color as set in Colors tab
Background pixmap — this option allows you to choose an image file to be used as background. You can press Browse button to choose the image file.
Transparent — this option makes GNOME Terminal use "transparent" background. It is not really transparent: it just mimics the background of your desktop (root window), much like a chameleon does. Do not expect to see other windows through the GNOME Terminal, though.
For Pixmap and Transparent backgrounds, you can also check the button Shade background, which will "shade", or "dim", the background image.
4.3. Colour configuration
Gnome terminal fully supports the colour extensions used by xterm. Colors tab allows you to control those colours.
- Colour scheme
Some applications are capable of using the colour capabilities of a terminal. The way the interaction between an application and the terminal is set up is that the application can request one of sixteen named colours (ANSI colours), such as "blue" or "bright red": for example, mutt mail reader can use red colour to show urgent messages. However, it is up to the terminal to decide which exact tint to use for "bright red" or "blue". This collection of sixteen colours is called a palette, or "colour scheme".
GNOME Terminal supports four colour schemes: the Linux console scheme, the Color Xterm scheme, the rxvt colour scheme, and a completely customizable colour scheme. They all are slightly different: for example, Linux console uses light gray in place of "white", while rxvt uses real white.
If you have selected the custom option, then all 16 colours (nominally 8 colours and 8 bright colours) can be customized by clicking on the colour selector buttons.
- Foreground/Background colours
Here you can set the default terminal foreground and background colours, which are used when no colours have been requested by the application running inside of GNOME Terminal.
The following options are available: white on black, black on white, green on black, black on light yellow, and custom. How these actually appear depends on the palette selected (for the white on black and black on white options). Custom allows you to select the default foreground and background colours individually and separate from the palette.
Additionally, the user can drag a colour from the rectangular box beneath the colour wheel from any GNOME colour selector or colour source and drop it into the terminal. If the user drops the colour on a blank space, it will set the background, if the user drops the colour on a cell that contains a character, it will change the foreground. This will also automatically change foreground/background type to Custom colours and set the custom foreground or background colour.
4.4. Scrolling
In this tab you can set the position of the scrollbar and the number of lines to keep in memory for scrolling.