This tab, new tabs and the default

Use a palette in this tab

❯ ttheme use miku  # this tab only
❯ ttheme use ho  # a unique prefix is enough

A tab only ever repaints itself, so the palette you use there stays until you change it. A mistyped name gets a suggestion instead of an error wall.

Set the default

❯ ttheme default kurisu

The default is the palette new tabs open with, in every terminal you wired, whichever one you run the command from. Open tabs where you never used a palette by hand follow it at once; a tab where you did keeps its palette. In Preview, enter on a palette and then Default does the same.

A new palette for every tab

Set TTHEME_TAB_PALETTE to seq and each new tab takes the next palette, in the order you installed them. The count is shared by every tab, so four new tabs give four different characters.

❯ ttheme config  # set TTHEME_TAB_PALETTE=seq

alt+c in ttheme changes the same setting in place. Set either way, Ghostty opens each new tab already showing its palette. off, the default, keeps new tabs on the default palette.

Turn it off and on

❯ ttheme off  # the terminal's own colors in every tab
❯ ttheme on  # the default palette again

off keeps everything installed. Pins, ssh pins and rotating new tabs rest until on, which uses the default in the tab you run it in and lets the others follow at their next prompt.

Changes reach every tab

A change made in one tab, such as a new default, a palette added or a pin set, reaches every other tab that sits idle at its prompt at once. A tab busy with a program catches up at its next prompt, or as soon as it comes to the front in a terminal that reports focus.

When a program resets the colors

Some programs put the terminal's colors back as they exit, such as Neovim with its default cursor or a background sync plugin. After each command, a tab showing a palette checks its colors and repaints itself if they changed. That takes about a quarter of a millisecond in Ghostty and needs no process.

Shells inside other programs

• An editor's terminal, such as Neovim's :terminal, Vim's, Emacs or VS Code: ttheme stays out, since the editor draws that terminal in its own theme. ttheme use there says to run it in a tab outside the editor.
• tmux: the colors belong to the terminal tab, not the pane, so a pane shows its palette again when it takes focus.
• bash and fish: every command works. What runs at each prompt, like a pin taking effect on cd, stays with zsh tabs.