The Konsole Handbook
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# Chapter 1. Introduction to Konsole

Konsole is an X terminal emulator which provides a command-line interface (CLI) while using the graphical K Desktop Environment. Konsole helps to better organize the user's desktop by containing multiple sessions in a single window (a less cluttered desktop).

Its advanced features include a simple configuration and the ability to use multiple terminal shells in a single window.

Using Konsole, a user can open:

- Linux console sessions

- Midnight Commander file manager sessions

- Shell sessions

- Root console sessions

These sessions can be renamed to help you keep track of all your shells, or signaled (STOP, CONT, HUP, INT, TERM, KILL).

For more control over Konsole, a user can:

- hide/show the menubar, toolbar and/or frame

- select the size of a Konsole window, fonts, color schemes, and key mapping

- change location of the scrollbar or hide the scrollbar

All chosen settings can be made the default for forthcoming sessions by saving them.

# 1.1. History

For those with a deep interest in the taxonomy of free X terminals, there are two others of this kind: xterm, the original, written even before X itself (a month or two), and xvt, a lightweight xterm clone, on which most other currently available derivatives (notably eterm) are based.

After a decade, Konsole is the first rewrite from the ground up. While xterm has definitely been hacked to death (its `README` starts with the words "Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here"), Konsole offers a fresh start using contemporary technologies and understanding of X.

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