01 Getting Started & UI Overview

1.1 System Requirements

WxTerm is a native cross-platform application supporting the following operating systems:

Platform	Minimum version	Notes
Windows	Windows 7	64-bit; Windows 7 requires the special build (see the website download page), Windows 10+ uses the standard build
macOS	10.15 Catalina	Both Intel and Apple Silicon
Linux	Any modern distribution	Requires a graphical environment (X11 or Wayland)

No Java, Electron, or browser runtime is required; a single executable file is enough to run.

1.2 Installation

Windows

Download the installer from the official website.
Double-click to run the installer.
After installation, launch “WxTerm” from the Start menu.

Serial port functionality requires the corresponding serial driver to be installed on the system (e.g. CH340/CP2102/FT232 drivers for USB-to-serial chips).

macOS

Download WxTerm-x.y.z.dmg.
Open the DMG and drag WxTerm into the “Applications” folder.
On first launch, if prompted “cannot verify developer”, go to “System Settings → Privacy & Security” and click “Open Anyway”.

Linux

Download the package in the matching format (.AppImage / .deb / .rpm).
AppImage: grant execute permission and run directly: chmod +x WxTerm-*.AppImage && ./WxTerm-*.AppImage.
deb: sudo dpkg -i wxterm_*.deb; rpm: sudo rpm -i wxterm-*.rpm.

On Linux, X11 forwarding requires X11-related libraries to be installed on the system (libxcb, etc.; most desktop distributions already include them by default).

Download page

1.3 First Launch

Configuration directory

Linux/BSD: ~/.wxterm/

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/wxterm/

Windows: %APPDATA%\wxterm\

On first launch, WxTerm will:

Create a configuration directory under the user’s home directory to store sessions, keys, themes, keymaps, and other settings.
Load the default dark theme and system language (if the system language is among the 20+ supported languages).
Display the welcome screen.

Welcome Screen

When no terminal tab is open, the main area shows the welcome screen, which provides three quick-entry cards:

Card	Function	Equivalent action
Quick Connect	Opens the quick connect dialog to connect to a host temporarily without saving a session	Menu “File → Quick Connect” or `Ctrl+Q`
New Session	Opens the new session dialog to configure and save a session	Menu “File → New Session” or `Ctrl+N`
Local Terminal	Directly opens a local shell tab (bash/zsh/PowerShell/cmd, depending on the system)	Toolbar “Local Terminal” button

The welcome screen cards display HUD-style sci-fi corner decorations under the “Sci-Fi” theme; see 09. Personalization.

1.4 Main Window Layout

The WxTerm main window uses a classic multi-region layout, from top to bottom and left to right:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Title Bar (38px)                                            │
│  [Sidebar toggle]  WxTerm  [Language][Theme][Min][Max][Close]│
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  Menu Bar (28px)                                             │
│  File  Edit  View  Options  Tools  Help                      │
├──────────┬──────────────────────────────────┬───────────────┤
│          │                                  │               │
│ Session  │                                  │   SSH Sidebar │
│ Sidebar  │       Terminal Area (Tabs)       │  (SSH only)   │
│          │                                  │  + AI Drawer  │
│          │                                  │  (on demand)  │
│          │                                  │               │
├──────────┴──────────────────────────────────┴───────────────┤
│  Status Bar                                                  │
│  [Conn status]  Protocol  Transfers  Split  Tabs  Ver  Clock │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Main window overview

Region Descriptions

Title Bar

38px high, a self-drawn title bar for the frameless window.
Left: session sidebar show/hide toggle.
Center: application name “WxTerm”.
Right: quick language switch, quick theme switch, window minimize/maximize/close buttons.
Drag the title bar to move the window; double-click to maximize/restore.

28px high, contains 6 top-level menus: File / Edit / View / Options / Tools / Help.
Detailed functions of each menu are covered in later chapters; for a quick reference see 12. Keyboard Shortcut Reference.

Tool Bar

38px high, located below the menu bar (can be hidden via the “View” menu).
Provides quick buttons for common actions: quick connect, local terminal, reconnect, new session, disconnect, copy, paste, find, settings, keymap editor, public key assistant, login.
The far right is the account login area, showing the current login status and plan info.

Tool bar

Left sidebar, displays saved sessions and folders in a tree structure.
Supports search filtering and a context menu (new folder/session, edit, delete, import/export, connect).
Drag sessions to reorder or move them to different folders.
Toggle visibility with Ctrl+B, the title bar toggle, or menu “View → Sidebar”.

Session sidebar

Terminal Area

The main workspace, displaying the terminal content of the currently active tab group.
Supports multi-tab, tab groups, and vertical split (see 03. Terminal, Tabs & Split Views).
The terminal supports true color, Unicode, and ligatures.

Only shown when the currently active tab is an SSH session, located on the right.
Composed of a 28px icon bar + a 320px content panel, containing three panels:
- System Overview: CPU, memory, disk, network, and OS info of the remote host.
- File Browser: SFTP remote file manager, supporting upload/download/drag-and-drop/context menu.
- Transfer List: file transfer task list and progress for the current session.
Switch panels or collapse the sidebar via the icon bar.

SSH sidebar three panels

AI Drawer

Expand via the [AI] button on each tab group’s right strip or Ctrl+Shift+A, side by side with the SSH sidebar.
Direct the AI in natural language to run commands, read/write files, and diagnose problems on the connected machine.
See 15 AI Assistant.

Status Bar

The bottom status bar displays:
- Left: connection status icon and text (Connecting / Connected / Disconnected).
- Right: number of transfer tasks, number of receive tasks, number of Modem transfers, split direction toggle, number of tab groups, current protocol, version number, real-time clock.
Click the transfer task count to restore the transfer queue panel.

1.5 Basic Workflow

A typical usage flow is as follows:

Connect to a remote host: connect temporarily via “Quick Connect”, or first create a “New Session” and save it, then double-click in the session sidebar to connect.
Perform terminal operations: type commands in the terminal area, use edit features such as copy/paste/find.
Transfer files (SSH): drag and drop via the file browser panel in the SSH sidebar, or use menu “Tools → Upload/Download”.
Use advanced features: open system management, port forwarding, script recording, and other tools as needed.
End the session: close the tab or use menu “File → Disconnect”; after logging out remotely, the connection is automatically closed and the window is closed.

1.6 Configuration File Locations