urxvt is a fast, lightweight terminal emulator that supports unicode. It is also very customizable. In this walkthrough, you’ll learn how to customize the color scheme of urxvt.
Installation
To install in Ubuntu use:
sudo apt install rxvt-unicode
Setup
Configuration for urxvt is done in the ~/.Xresources file. If you don’t have one, you can create it in your home directory.
terminal.sexy is a great resource for viewing and downloading terminal themes. Simply:
1. Navigate to the site and browse the themes. Locate one you like.
2. Click on the Export tab and select Xresources from the drop down.
3. Click on the Export button which will populate the list with the theme. Copy and paste the values into your .Xresources file.
4. Change all instances of * to be urxvt and then save your file.
Note that in the ~/.Xresources file, a ! is used to show a comment, not a #.
Once saved, the changes will not take effect immediately. You will need to perform the following order of actions:
1. Run the command xrdb -merge ~/.Xresources
2. Log out of any terminal instances.
3. Launch a new terminal.
At this point your color changes will have taken effect.
Tips
I keep several .Xresources files for different themes in my home folder. The format is:
.Xresources.solarizeddark
.Xresources.molokai
.Xresources.materialblue
I’ve also created the alias below in my .bashrc to reload the .XResources file:
alias ureload='xrdb -merge ~/.Xresources
When it is time to change a theme, I will cp the new theme over the old one, and then run ureload. For example:
cp .XResources.solarizeddark .XResources
ureload
I have other configurations for urxvt in my .XResources file, so when I want to add a new theme, I simply copy the current one and replace the color scheme data. This should be all the basics you need to get started.