# The Secret Rules of the Terminal explains shells, emulators, escape codes, and TTY drivers

DevFeed: [The Secret Rules of the Terminal explains shells, emulators, escape codes, and TTY drivers](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/worth-reading-the-secret-rules-of-the-terminal-11221.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://blog.ipspace.net/2025/07/worth-reading-secret-rules-terminal/>)

Published: 2025-07-09T06:36:00Z

Content type: opinion

Language: en

Sources: [ipSpace.net blog](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/ipspace-net-blog.md>)

Topics: [Terminal](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/terminal.md>), [Command-line interface](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/cli.md>), [Linux](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/linux.md>)

Tags: [blog](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/blog.md>), [posts](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/posts.md>), [terminal](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/terminal.md>), [worth-reading](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/worth-reading.md>), [writing](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/writing.md>)

## AI overview

This commentary recommends Julia Evans's The Secret Rules of the Terminal, which explores why terminal behavior varies across shells, terminal emulators, escape codes, and the TTY driver.

## Source excerpt

Did you ever wonder why pressing an up-arrow in a (Linux) terminal window sometimes recalls the previous command but other times creates ^[[A? Julia Evans did, and spent months exploring the quirks of the Linux terminal (and writing blog posts describing what she found), finally resulting in The Secret Rules of the Terminal (including the various shells, terminal emulators, escape codes, and TTY driver). A must-read if you're a newbie who wants to understand why things happen the way they do.