How to Put Color on Windows Console

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Introduction

Now Windows have support for ANSI colors!

On old builds (Windows 10 1909 or prior), Windows just recognizes the ESC code ¹, but it is possible for Windows to recognize the ESC code \033 (or other depending on the language) with a modification in the record (regedit.exe).

The Modification

For modification, you need to run the command below (on CMD as administrator):

reg add HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Console /v VirtualTerminalLevel /t REG_DWORD /d 0x00000001 /f

In case of error (it'll have no error, but...), here is the command to undo: (on CMD as administrator)

reg add HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Console /v VirtualTerminalLevel /t REG_DWORD /d 0x00000000 /f

With this modification, you can compile the same program for Windows and Linux without changing anything; before to color the text of the console on Python for Linux, you used the ESC code, on Windows you used a library, so you had to write the same program twice!

Colors

To use a color, you need to write the ANSI color, your text and the ANSI color default.

Here goes an example of this in Python:

print("\033[31mThis is red\033[0m")

In C:

int main() {
    printf("\033[33mThis is yellow\033[0m");
    return 0;
}

In C++:

#include <iostream>

int main() {
    std::cout << "\033[32mThis is green\033[0m" << std::endl;
    return 0;
}

In C#:

class Program {
    static void Main() {
        System.Console.WriteLine("\u001b[35mThis is purple\u001b[0m");
    }
}

In Java:²

public class Color {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        System.out.println("\033[36mThis is cyan\033[0m");
    }
}

And in batch:

echo This is blue

Access this site for more information and others ANSIs.

Where Does It Work?

This method of the modification works (that I tested) in Python, C, C++ and Java, but doesn't work in batch, there the <ESC> has to be , and in C#, there the <ESC> has to be \u001b.

Why Would I Use That?

With this method, you can compile for Linux without modification in Python, C, C++, C# and Java.

Notes

¹ The character is a rectangle, if a question appears for you, just copy and paste it into Notepad and it will appear correctly.

² If you click on jar file, nothing will happen, to run you have to call from the prompt, for that run the command lower in the folder that is jar file:

java -jar "program.jar"

where program.jar is the name of the jar file.

History

• 1^st January, 2020: Initial version
• 21^st February, 2020: C# update
• 9^th March, 2020: Java update
• 18^th August, 2020: colors' update

Read My Other Article

• Linux on Windows

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