Unable to type in a terminal

Question

When I open a terminal no cursor appears, and no text, I just get a blank black screen. I am able to run commands by pressing Ctrl-Alt-F2.

I have minimal understanding of typing code etc. (Using Ubuntu 14.04 with Xfce interface.) Thank you if you're able to help.

Is this just in the graphical terminal? Or is it other apps as well? — Moose, Oct 20 '14 at 03:16
What happens if you press a Ctrl+C after opening the terminal? Does the prompt appear? — sourav c., Oct 20 '14 at 06:07
Nothing happened with Ctrl+C. Yes, just the graphical terminal as far as I'm aware. — Lake, Oct 20 '14 at 20:14
Possible duplicate of Why do I have no prompt in terminal on XFCE in ubuntu 12.04 — TecBrat, Jul 01 '16 at 10:19

score 2 · Answer 1 · edited Aug 13 '25 at 16:56

2

Just go to your home directory then open the .bashrc file.

Comment out this line

# Load Angular CLI autocompletion. 

source <(ng completion script)

So now, it should look like this:

# Load Angular CLI autocompletion. 

#source <(ng completion script)

edited Aug 13 '25 at 16:56

Zanna

72,471

answered May 28 '24 at 14:56

kevine oyanda

21

score 1 · Answer 2 · edited Aug 13 '25 at 16:55

In the case of command execution from WSL, once cursor is above INSERT command or even when the cursor doesn't appear, directly gets copied from clipboard so just copy the command that you want to type and place the cursor. This happens when you add or edit contents of a file within a corresponding path. Example:

[ansadmin@DESKTOP-M6D3UNM myproject]$ vi ansible.cfg

Within this file, I was unable to type or edit, so I entered the below command in notepad, copied it and once I placed the cursor, the command was auto pasted from clipboard. I then saved using esc and by :wq!

[defaults]
inventory=./inventory
host_key_checking=False

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered May 09 '19 at 07:06

0

Open terminal go to -> edit -> Preferences -> Command Select only checkbox (checked) Run command as a login shell (Remove check) Run a custom command instead of my shell

answered May 09 '19 at 07:06

HoaTruong

1

score 0 · Answer 4 · edited Jan 14 '20 at 19:58

0

Open Terminal
Edit option -> Preferences
Under Command tab select checkbox with option "Run command a a login Shell" and uncheck other options.
Restart the command

edited Jan 14 '20 at 19:58

Flow

2,476

answered Jan 14 '20 at 11:44

user1034098

1

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Oct 20 '14 at 08:22

To resolve this cursor visible issue, please open a terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and use the following command.

gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.cursor active false

After executing the above command please check whether the cursor issue resolved. If still this issue persist, go to "settings - displays - disable unknown display".

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 20 '14 at 08:50

0

Open Terminal and go to "Profile preferences" from main Edit menu in Terminal and check below configuration:

enter image description here

"Text color" and "Background color" with different color and also if you don't want custom color click on "Use colors from system theme" check box and then click close.

answered Oct 20 '14 at 08:50

αғsнιη

36,400

Wonderful! It worked, and such a simple solution. "Use colors from the system theme" was ticked (with no indication of what colors were being used for what), so I unticked that and chose white text on black background, which now appears. Thanks! – Lake Oct 20 '14 at 20:18

Unable to type in a terminal

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