TERMINAL-COLORS.D(5)             File formats             TERMINAL-COLORS.D(5)

NAME
       terminal-colors.d - configure output colorization for various utilities

SYNOPSIS
       /etc/terminal-colors.d/[name.|[name]@term.]type

DESCRIPTION
       Files in this directory determine the default behavior for utilities
       when coloring output.

       The name is a utility name. The name is optional and when none is
       specified then the file is used for all unspecified utilities.

       The term is a terminal identifier (the TERM environment variable). The
       terminal identifier is optional and when none is specified then the
       file is used for all unspecified terminals.

       The type is a file type. Supported file types are:

          disable
              Turns off output colorization for all compatible
              utilities. See also the NO_COLOR environment variable
              below.

          enable
              Turns on output colorization; any matching disable files
              are ignored.

          scheme
              Specifies colors used for output. The file format may be
              specific to the utility, the default format is described
              below.

       If there are more files that match for a utility, then the file with
       the more specific filename wins. For example, the filename
       @xterm.scheme has less priority than dmesg@xterm.scheme. The lowest
       priority are those files without a utility name and terminal identifier
       (e.g., "disable").

       The user-specific $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/terminal-colors.d or
       $HOME/.config/terminal-colors.d overrides the global setting.

DEFAULT SCHEME FILES FORMAT
       The following statement is recognized:

          name color-sequence

       The name is a logical name for the color sequence (for example: error).
       The names are specific to the utilities. For more details always see
       the COLORS section in the man page for the utility.

       The color-sequence can be a color name, an ANSI color sequence, or an
       escape sequence.

   Color names
       Valid color names are: black, blink, blue, bold, brown, cyan, darkgray,
       gray, green, halfbright, lightblue, lightcyan, lightgray, lightgreen,
       lightmagenta, lightred, magenta, red, reset, reverse, and yellow.

   ANSI color sequences
       An ANSI color sequence is composed of sequences of numbers separated by
       semicolons. The most common codes are:

       +---+--------------------------+
       |0  | to restore default color |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |1  | for brighter colors      |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |4  | for underlined text      |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |5  | for flashing text        |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |30 | for black foreground     |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |31 | for red foreground       |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |32 | for green foreground     |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |33 | for yellow (or brown)    |
       |   | foreground               |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |34 | for blue foreground      |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |35 | for purple foreground    |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |36 | for cyan foreground      |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |37 | for white (or gray)      |
       |   | foreground               |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |40 | for black background     |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |41 | for red background       |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |42 | for green background     |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |43 | for yellow (or brown)    |
       |   | background               |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |44 | for blue background      |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |45 | for purple background    |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |46 | for cyan background      |
       +---+--------------------------+
       |47 | for white (or gray)      |
       |   | background               |
       +---+--------------------------+

       For example, to use a red background for alert messages in the output
       of dmesg(1), use:

         echo 'alert 37;41' >> /etc/terminal-colors.d/dmesg.scheme

   Escape sequences
       An escape sequence is needed to enter a space, backslash, caret, or any
       control character anywhere in a string, as well as a hash mark as the
       first character. These C-style backslash-escapes can be used:

       +----+----------------------------+
       |\a  | Bell (ASCII 7)             |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\b  | Backspace (ASCII 8)        |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\e  | Escape (ASCII 27)          |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\f  | Form feed (ASCII 12)       |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\n  | Newline (ASCII 10)         |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\r  | Carriage Return (ASCII 13) |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\t  | Tab (ASCII 9)              |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\v  | Vertical Tab (ASCII 11)    |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\?  | Delete (ASCII 127)         |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\_  | Space                      |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\\  | Backslash (\)              |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\^  | Caret (^)                  |
       +----+----------------------------+
       |\\# | Hash mark (#)              |
       +----+----------------------------+

   Comments
       Lines where the first non-blank character is a # (hash) are ignored.
       Any other use of the hash character is not interpreted as introducing a
       comment.

ENVIRONMENT
       TERMINAL_COLORS_DEBUG=all
           enables debug output.

       NO_COLOR
           if defined, this disables output colorization unless explicitly
           enabled by a command-line option. See  <https://no-color.org/> for
           more details. Supported since util-linux version 2.41.

FILES
       $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/terminal-colors.d

       $HOME/.config/terminal-colors.d

       /etc/terminal-colors.d

EXAMPLES
       Disable colors for all compatible utilities:

          touch /etc/terminal-colors.d/disable

       Disable colors for all compatible utils on a vt100 terminal:

          touch /etc/terminal-colors.d/@vt100.disable

       Disable colors for all compatible utils except dmesg(1):

          touch /etc/terminal-colors.d/disable
          touch /etc/terminal-colors.d/dmesg.enable

COMPATIBILITY
       The terminal-colors.d functionality is currently supported by all
       util-linux utilities which provide colorized output. For more details
       always see the COLORS section in the man page for the utility.

REPORTING BUGS
       For bug reports, use the issue tracker
       <https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues>.

AVAILABILITY
       terminal-colors.d is part of the util-linux package which can be
       downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive
       <https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>.

util-linux 2.42.1                 2026-05-18              TERMINAL-COLORS.D(5)