Cross-platform terminal workspace with native shell sessions, SSH orchestration, contextual file operations, and integrated editing.
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Termif is a desktop terminal product for operators and developers who move constantly between local and remote environments. The application combines low-latency local PTY sessions, SSH session orchestration, and a context-bound file workspace in one frame. Instead of treating terminal, files, and editor as disconnected utilities, Termif keeps those surfaces synchronized around the active tab context and connection state.
The product now targets Windows, macOS, and Linux from the same codebase. Platform differences are isolated to shell/profile resolution, keyboard conventions, window controls, filesystem roots, and release packaging, while terminal, SSH, editor, and workspace behavior remain shared.
Termif ships a custom app shell with premium tab behaviors, including rename, color tagging, duplication, fast close, and keyboard-driven switching with MRU or positional mode. The top-level command palette orchestrates workspace actions without forcing users through deep menu trees. A native-feeling title bar, custom window controls, and layout docking keep interaction density high without losing clarity.
Local sessions run through portable PTY integration and stream output to xterm.js in real time. SSH sessions are provisioned through a host picker that merges imported ~/.ssh/config hosts and managed hosts, supports grouping, allows alias overrides, and can persist quick-connect definitions. When remote sessions degrade, the UI surfaces explicit disconnect reasons and uses reconnect flows instead of silent failure.
The sidebar is contextual. For local tabs, it operates on local filesystem paths. For SSH tabs, it resolves the remote path via the active session and performs remote listing, read, and write operations. The editor layer supports preview and edit modes, tracks dirty state, opens in docked mode or separate windows, and keeps remote versus local provenance visible per file tab.
The status bar supplies SSH runtime telemetry with CPU, RAM, disk, user counts, and server clock snapshots, while local clock and visibility controls remain configurable from settings.
Termif is built as a Tauri v2 desktop shell with a React + TypeScript frontend and a Rust backend.
The frontend handles interaction surfaces, state projection, and keyboard orchestration. A centralized Zustand store coordinates tabs, host state, file context, editor workspace, and UI overlays. xterm.js handles rendering, and terminal output is delivered through Tauri channels rather than polling.
The backend owns session lifecycle, SSH transport, filesystem operations, settings, host persistence, and monitoring loops. Local shell sessions are spawned through portable-pty. SSH execution, shell channels, and remote command capture run through russh. Persistence is file-based JSON in the Tauri app data directory with atomic temp-file replacement for writes.
For architectural deep dive, read ARCHITECTURE.md.
Termif persists operational state in JSON artifacts that are explicitly scoped by concern: settings.json for runtime preferences, hosts.json for managed hosts/groups/import overrides, and ui_state.json for tab presentation metadata and active tab restoration. Snippets are currently persisted in frontend localStorage and bound to the client environment.
On startup, Termif attempts to recover saved tab metadata and reconstruct local or SSH-picker tabs. If restoration is missing or invalid, the product falls back to creating a default local tab to preserve a bootable workspace.
Detailed model and compatibility rules are documented in docs/persistence-model.md and docs/settings-model.md.
Release packaging targets Windows MSI/NSIS installers, macOS DMG/App bundles, and Linux DEB/AppImage packages. GitHub Actions validates and builds on Windows, macOS, and Ubuntu, then publishes platform artifacts with SHA-256 checksum files.
Local shell defaults follow the host platform: PowerShell on Windows, zsh on macOS, and bash on Linux. App shortcuts use Ctrl on Windows/Linux and Command on macOS, while terminal control sequences such as Ctrl+C remain available to the running shell. SSH host import/export resolves the user's platform home directory and uses the standard ~/.ssh/config location on every OS.
Termif surfaces concrete failures rather than generic UI states. If a session id is stale, backend calls return session not found. If SSH authentication fails, the UI receives an explicit password/key rejected message. Remote list/read/write commands propagate stderr payloads when available. Unsupported operations, such as invoking remote-only behavior on local sessions, return deterministic unsupported operation errors. Missing ~/.ssh/config files are handled as an empty import set instead of a fatal condition.
ARCHITECTURE.md describes runtime boundaries and execution paths.
ROADMAP.md tracks product direction and delivery themes.
CONTRIBUTING.md defines repository standards and review contract.
docs/settings-model.md, docs/persistence-model.md, docs/plugin-system-proposal.md, and docs/ci-release-plan.md cover subsystem specifications.
Termif is distributed under the Termif Attribution License 1.0. Forking and modification are allowed, including commercial distribution, as long as attribution obligations are preserved. In practice, derivative repositories and redistributed products must keep copyright notices and provide visible credit to the original Termif project.
Full legal text: LICENSE.