Aether Command

A modern, clean terminal emulator built with Vala, GTK4 and LibAdwaita. Originally designed for AetherDE desktop environment, but works on any Linux distribution with GTK4 support.

Features

• Clean and intuitive GNOME-integrated interface
• Dynamic window title showing current command or prompt
• Full VTE terminal emulation support
• Lightweight and fast
• Native LibAdwaita design

Requirements

• GTK4 >= 4.0
• LibAdwaita >= 1.0
• VTE >= 0.70 (vte-2.91-gtk4)
• Vala >= 0.56
• Meson >= 0.60
• Ninja

Installing Dependencies

Arch Linux

sudo pacman -S gtk4 libadwaita vte4 vala meson ninja git

Fedora

sudo dnf install gtk4-devel libadwaita-devel vte291-gtk4-devel vala meson ninja-build git

Ubuntu / Debian

sudo apt install libgtk-4-dev libadwaita-1-dev libvte-2.91-gtk4-dev valac meson ninja-build git

openSUSE

sudo zypper install gtk4-devel libadwaita-devel vte-devel vala meson ninja git

Gentoo

sudo emerge --ask x11-libs/gtk+:4 gui-libs/libadwaita x11-libs/vte dev-lang/vala dev-build/meson dev-build/ninja

Alpine Linux

sudo apk add gtk4.0-dev libadwaita-dev vte3-dev vala meson ninja git

Void Linux

sudo xbps-install -S gtk4-devel libadwaita-devel vte3-gtk4-devel vala meson ninja git

Building from Source

Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/NurOS-Linux/command.git
cd command

Build

meson setup builddir
ninja -C builddir

Run without installing

./builddir/aether-command

Installation

System-wide installation

sudo ninja -C builddir install

Uninstall

sudo ninja -C builddir uninstall

Usage

Launch from your application menu or run from terminal:

aether-command

The window title will automatically update to show:

• Your shell prompt (e.g., user@hostname: ~)
• Running program names (e.g., vim, htop, nano)
• Current working directory

Development

Project Structure

aether-command/
├── src/
│   ├── main.vala       # Application entry point
│   ├── window.vala     # Main window implementation
│   └── terminal.vala   # VTE terminal widget wrapper
├── data/
│   ├── window.ui                       # GTK UI template
│   ├── org.aether.command.desktop.in   # Desktop entry
│   └── org.aether.command.metainfo.xml.in # AppStream metadata
├── img/
│   └── screenshot.png  # Application screenshot
├── meson.build         # Build configuration
└── LICENSE             # GPL-3.0 license text

Code Style

This project follows standard Vala coding conventions:

• 4 spaces for indentation
• Snake_case for methods and variables
• PascalCase for classes and namespaces

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for detailed guidelines on how to contribute to the project.

Technical Details

• Language: Vala (compiles to C)
• GUI Toolkit: GTK4
• Design System: LibAdwaita
• Terminal Backend: VTE (Virtual Terminal Emulator)
• Build System: Meson + Ninja
• Application ID: org.aether.command

License

This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 - see the LICENSE file for details.

Copyright (C) 2026 NurOS

Developer

AnmiTaliDev anmitali198@gmail.com