💫 Make your terminal swoosh

I’ve been using ghostty for a while and I’ve been loving it!

One thing that I’ve always loved in my terminals is a “swoosh” type cursor - it makes it really easy to follow when screensharing (and it also looks really cool).

Here’s an example of what I am talking about:

If you want to do something similar, it’s pretty easy:

1. Save the shader file

Ghostty supports shaders to change the graphical aspect of the terminal. To cut to the chase, here’s the one that I use for the cursor:

💫 View shader
float ease(float x) {
    return pow(1.0 - x, 10.0);
}

float sdBox(in vec2 p, in vec2 xy, in vec2 b)
{
    vec2 d = abs(p - xy) - b;
    return length(max(d, 0.0)) + min(max(d.x, d.y), 0.0);
}

float getSdfRectangle(in vec2 p, in vec2 xy, in vec2 b)
{
    vec2 d = abs(p - xy) - b;
    return length(max(d, 0.0)) + min(max(d.x, d.y), 0.0);
}
// Based on Inigo Quilez's 2D distance functions article: https://iquilezles.org/articles/distfunctions2d/
// Potencially optimized by eliminating conditionals and loops to enhance performance and reduce branching
float seg(in vec2 p, in vec2 a, in vec2 b, inout float s, float d) {
    vec2 e = b - a;
    vec2 w = p - a;
    vec2 proj = a + e * clamp(dot(w, e) / dot(e, e), 0.0, 1.0);
    float segd = dot(p - proj, p - proj);
    d = min(d, segd);

    float c0 = step(0.0, p.y - a.y);
    float c1 = 1.0 - step(0.0, p.y - b.y);
    float c2 = 1.0 - step(0.0, e.x * w.y - e.y * w.x);
    float allCond = c0 * c1 * c2;
    float noneCond = (1.0 - c0) * (1.0 - c1) * (1.0 - c2);
    float flip = mix(1.0, -1.0, step(0.5, allCond + noneCond));
    s *= flip;
    return d;
}

float getSdfParallelogram(in vec2 p, in vec2 v0, in vec2 v1, in vec2 v2, in vec2 v3) {
    float s = 1.0;
    float d = dot(p - v0, p - v0);

    d = seg(p, v0, v3, s, d);
    d = seg(p, v1, v0, s, d);
    d = seg(p, v2, v1, s, d);
    d = seg(p, v3, v2, s, d);

    return s * sqrt(d);
}

vec2 normalize(vec2 value, float isPosition) {
    return (value * 2.0 - (iResolution.xy * isPosition)) / iResolution.y;
}

float blend(float t)
{
    float sqr = t * t;
    return sqr / (2.0 * (sqr - t) + 1.0);
}

float antialising(float distance) {
    return 1. - smoothstep(0., normalize(vec2(2., 2.), 0.).x, distance);
}

float determineStartVertexFactor(vec2 a, vec2 b) {
    // Conditions using step
    float condition1 = step(b.x, a.x) * step(a.y, b.y); // a.x < b.x && a.y > b.y
    float condition2 = step(a.x, b.x) * step(b.y, a.y); // a.x > b.x && a.y < b.y

    // If neither condition is met, return 1 (else case)
    return 1.0 - max(condition1, condition2);
}
vec2 getRectangleCenter(vec4 rectangle) {
    return vec2(rectangle.x + (rectangle.z / 2.), rectangle.y - (rectangle.w / 2.));
}

const vec4 TRAIL_COLOR = vec4(0.47, 0.63, 0.96, 1.0);
const vec4 CURRENT_CURSOR_COLOR = TRAIL_COLOR;
const vec4 PREVIOUS_CURSOR_COLOR = TRAIL_COLOR;
// const vec4 TRAIL_COLOR = vec4(0.482, 0.886, 1.0, 1.0);
//rgb(47.843% 63.529% 96.863%)
const vec4 TRAIL_COLOR_ACCENT = vec4(0.47, 0.63, 0.96, 1.0); // red-orange
//const vec4 TRAIL_COLOR_ACCENT = vec4(1.0, 0.725, 0.161, 1.0); // yellow
// const vec4 TRAIL_COLOR_ACCENT = vec4(0.0, 0.424, 1.0, 1.0);
const float DURATION = .5;
const float OPACITY = .2;

void mainImage(out vec4 fragColor, in vec2 fragCoord)
{
    #if !defined(WEB)
    fragColor = texture(iChannel0, fragCoord.xy / iResolution.xy);
    #endif
    //Normalization for fragCoord to a space of -1 to 1;
    vec2 vu = normalize(fragCoord, 1.);
    vec2 offsetFactor = vec2(-.5, 0.5);

    //Normalization for cursor position and size;
    //cursor xy has the postion in a space of -1 to 1;
    //zw has the width and height
    vec4 currentCursor = vec4(normalize(iCurrentCursor.xy, 1.), normalize(iCurrentCursor.zw, 0.));
    vec4 previousCursor = vec4(normalize(iPreviousCursor.xy, 1.), normalize(iPreviousCursor.zw, 0.));

    //When drawing a parellelogram between cursors for the trail i need to determine where to start at the top-left or top-right vertex of the cursor
    float vertexFactor = determineStartVertexFactor(currentCursor.xy, previousCursor.xy);
    float invertedVertexFactor = 1.0 - vertexFactor;

    //Set every vertex of my parellogram
    vec2 v0 = vec2(currentCursor.x + currentCursor.z * vertexFactor, currentCursor.y - currentCursor.w);
    vec2 v1 = vec2(currentCursor.x + currentCursor.z * invertedVertexFactor, currentCursor.y);
    vec2 v2 = vec2(previousCursor.x + currentCursor.z * invertedVertexFactor, previousCursor.y);
    vec2 v3 = vec2(previousCursor.x + currentCursor.z * vertexFactor, previousCursor.y - previousCursor.w);

    vec4 newColor = vec4(fragColor);

    float progress = blend(clamp((iTime - iTimeCursorChange) / DURATION, 0.0, 1));
    float easedProgress = ease(progress);

    //Distance between cursors determine the total length of the parallelogram;
    vec2 centerCC = getRectangleCenter(currentCursor);
    vec2 centerCP = getRectangleCenter(previousCursor);
    float lineLength = distance(centerCC, centerCP);
    float distanceToEnd = distance(vu.xy, centerCC);
    float alphaModifier = distanceToEnd / (lineLength * (easedProgress));
    //float alphaModifier = distanceToEnd / (lineLength * (1 - progress));

    if (alphaModifier > 1.0) {
      alphaModifier = 1.0;
    }

    float sdfCursor = getSdfRectangle(vu, currentCursor.xy - (currentCursor.zw * offsetFactor), currentCursor.zw * 0.5);
    float sdfTrail = getSdfParallelogram(vu, v0, v1, v2, v3);

    newColor = mix(newColor, TRAIL_COLOR_ACCENT, 1.0 - smoothstep(sdfTrail, -0.01, 0.001));
    newColor = mix(newColor, TRAIL_COLOR, antialising(sdfTrail));

    newColor = mix(fragColor, newColor, 1.0 - alphaModifier);
    fragColor = mix(newColor, fragColor, step(sdfCursor, 0));

}

Save this anywhere on your disk, ideally in your ~/.config/ghostty folder

2. Tell ghostty to use it

Just add this line to your ~/.config/ghostty/config file:

custom-shader = ./cursor-smear.glsl

That’s it, enjoy your swooshiness! 💫