fix(terminal): strip OSC/DA query responses from persisted history by murataslan1 · Pull Request #1295 · pingdotgg/t3code

murataslan1 · 2026-03-22T00:27:45Z

Summary

Terminal sessions show gibberish like 10;rgb:f5f5/f5f5/f5f5 after restore.

Root Cause

When the terminal emulator queries colors (OSC 10/11) or device attributes (DA), the terminal responds with escape sequences. These responses are saved into session.history and replayed on restore. Since the xterm.js instance during restore doesn't consume them as query responses, they appear as visible text.

Fix

Strip OSC color report responses (\e]10;...\e\\, \e]11;...\e\\) and DA responses (\e[?1;2c) from data before persisting to history. Live output to the terminal emitter is unchanged so xterm.js can still process them in real-time.

Test plan

Start a terminal session, let it run
Restart the app or reload the session
Verify no escape code gibberish appears in the restored terminal

Fixes #1238

Note

Strip OSC and Device Attributes query responses from persisted terminal history

Adds stripTerminalQueryResponses in Manager.ts that removes OSC sequences (ESC ] ... ESC \ or BEL) and DA responses (ESC [ ? digits/semicolons c) via regex.
onProcessData sanitizes data before appending to session.history; the raw data is still emitted on the output event.
readHistory sanitizes history loaded from disk and rewrites the file if the sanitized content differs from what was stored.

^{Macroscope summarized c1b2c83.}

Terminal color query responses (OSC 10/11 foreground/background reports) and Device Attributes responses leak into the saved terminal history. When the session is restored, these escape sequences appear as visible gibberish like "10;rgb:f5f5/f5f5/f5f5" in the terminal. Strip these query responses from the data before persisting to history while still forwarding raw data to the live terminal emitter so xterm.js can process them correctly. Fixes pingdotgg#1238

coderabbitai · 2026-03-22T00:27:52Z

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Copilot

Pull request overview

This PR addresses terminal restore “gibberish” by preventing OSC color report (OSC 10/11) and Device Attributes (DA) query responses from being persisted into session.history, so restored sessions don’t replay those responses as visible text.

Changes:

Added a helper to strip terminal query response escape sequences from output before saving to history.
Updated onProcessData to append sanitized output to session.history while still emitting the original live data.

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Copilot · 2026-03-22T00:31:08Z

apps/server/src/terminal/Layers/Manager.ts

  private onProcessData(session: TerminalSessionState, data: string): void {
-    session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${data}`, this.historyLineLimit);
+    const cleanData = stripTerminalQueryResponses(data);
+    session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${cleanData}`, this.historyLineLimit);


Since sanitization is only applied to new incoming data, any existing persisted history that already contains OSC/DA response gibberish (from older versions) will continue to show up on restore until the user clears history. If the goal is to fix the symptom immediately after upgrade, consider also stripping these sequences when reading history (and rewriting the capped/cleaned history file), or performing a one-time migration/cleanup on open.

Suggested change

session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${cleanData}`, this.historyLineLimit);

const combinedHistory = stripTerminalQueryResponses(`${session.history}${cleanData}`);

session.history = capHistory(combinedHistory, this.historyLineLimit);

Copilot · 2026-03-22T00:31:08Z

apps/server/src/terminal/Layers/Manager.ts

+  // OSC responses: \x1b] ... ST  where ST is \x1b\\ or \x07
+  // Examples: \x1b]10;rgb:f5f5/f5f5/f5f5\x1b\\  (foreground color report)
+  //           \x1b]11;rgb:1616/1616/1616\x07      (background color report)
+  // DA responses: \x1b[ ... c   (Device Attributes)
+  // Example: \x1b[?1;2c
+  return data
+    .replace(/\x1b\][^\x07\x1b]*(?:\x1b\\|\x07)/g, "")


The OSC-stripping regex currently removes any OSC sequence (ESC ] ... ST/BEL), not just color report responses for OSC 10/11 as described in the PR. This will also drop other OSC features (e.g., OSC 8 hyperlinks, title updates, OSC 7 cwd hints) from restored history, which is a behavior change/regression. Consider narrowing the pattern to only match OSC 10 and 11 responses (and ideally the expected response payload forms) so other OSC sequences remain intact in persisted history.

Suggested change

// OSC responses: \x1b] ... ST where ST is \x1b\\ or \x07

// Examples: \x1b]10;rgb:f5f5/f5f5/f5f5\x1b\\ (foreground color report)

// \x1b]11;rgb:1616/1616/1616\x07 (background color report)

// DA responses: \x1b[ ... c (Device Attributes)

// Example: \x1b[?1;2c

return data

.replace(/\x1b\][^\x07\x1b]*(?:\x1b\\|\x07)/g, "")

// OSC responses (color reports only): \x1b]10;...ST or \x1b]11;...ST

// ST is \x1b\\ or \x07

// Examples: \x1b]10;rgb:f5f5/f5f5/f5f5\x1b\\ (foreground color report)

// \x1b]11;rgb:1616/1616/1616\x07 (background color report)

// DA responses: \x1b[ ... c (Device Attributes)

// Example: \x1b[?1;2c

return data

.replace(/\x1b\](1[01]);[^\x07\x1b]*(?:\x1b\\|\x07)/g, "")

Copilot · 2026-03-22T00:31:08Z

apps/server/src/terminal/Layers/Manager.ts

  private onProcessData(session: TerminalSessionState, data: string): void {
-    session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${data}`, this.historyLineLimit);
+    const cleanData = stripTerminalQueryResponses(data);
+    session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${cleanData}`, this.historyLineLimit);


Stripping is applied per onData chunk (stripTerminalQueryResponses(data)), but PTY data events can split escape sequences across chunks. If an OSC/DA response is split, the first fragment will be persisted (and the terminator fragment won’t match either), so the gibberish can still show up after restore. A more reliable approach is to sanitize on the concatenated stream (e.g., apply stripping to the full history right before persisting / when reading history), or keep a small per-session buffer for incomplete trailing escape sequences between chunks.

Copilot · 2026-03-22T00:31:09Z

apps/server/src/terminal/Layers/Manager.ts

+    const cleanData = stripTerminalQueryResponses(data);
+    session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${cleanData}`, this.historyLineLimit);


This change introduces new sanitization logic for persisted terminal history, but there doesn’t appear to be a unit test covering it (the repo already has extensive TerminalManagerRuntime history persistence tests). Adding tests that (1) verify OSC 10/11 + DA responses are removed from the persisted history, (2) verify non-target OSC sequences are preserved (if intended), and (3) verify emitted live output events still contain the original data would help prevent regressions.

nmggithub · 2026-03-22T04:21:33Z

This is a potentially nice sanitization layer, but I'm not sure if this actually fixes the problem or just papers over it. I wonder how OSC/DA query responses are getting into our persisted history in the first place.

Handles sessions saved before this fix — any OSC/DA sequences already on disk are cleaned on load so they don't appear on restore.

murataslan1 · 2026-03-22T07:44:22Z

Good question. Here's what's happening:

xterm.js queries the terminal for colors (OSC 10/11) and the PTY responds with sequences like \e]10;rgb:f5f5/...\e\\. These responses come through the same onData callback as regular output, so they end up in session.history. On restore, terminal.write(history) replays everything — but this time xterm.js didn't send the original query, so it doesn't consume the responses and they show up as text.

There's no way to distinguish these from normal output at the transport level since they share the same stream. Stripping before persistence is the right place to handle it. Also added stripping in readHistory() to clean up already-saved sessions.

Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings March 22, 2026 00:27

github-actions bot added size:S 10-29 changed lines (additions + deletions). vouch:unvouched PR author is not yet trusted in the VOUCHED list. labels Mar 22, 2026

Copilot started reviewing on behalf of murataslan1 March 22, 2026 00:28 View session

Copilot AI reviewed Mar 22, 2026

View reviewed changes

fix: also strip OSC responses when loading persisted history

c1b2c83

Handles sessions saved before this fix — any OSC/DA sequences already on disk are cleaned on load so they don't appear on restore.

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fix(terminal): strip OSC/DA query responses from persisted history#1295

fix(terminal): strip OSC/DA query responses from persisted history#1295
murataslan1 wants to merge 2 commits intopingdotgg:mainfrom
murataslan1:fix/terminal-osc-response-filter

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	session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${cleanData}`, this.historyLineLimit);
	const combinedHistory = stripTerminalQueryResponses(`${session.history}${cleanData}`);
	session.history = capHistory(combinedHistory, this.historyLineLimit);

		const cleanData = stripTerminalQueryResponses(data);
		session.history = capHistory(`${session.history}${cleanData}`, this.historyLineLimit);

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murataslan1 commented Mar 22, 2026 • edited by macroscopeapp bot Loading Uh oh! There was an error while loading. Please reload this page.

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Summary

Root Cause

Fix

Test plan

Strip OSC and Device Attributes query responses from persisted terminal history

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