#External Terminal Launcher

A JetBrains IDE plugin (PhpStorm and other IntelliJ-based IDEs) that opens an external terminal emulator at your project's root directory — from a top-toolbar button or a Tools menu action. Terminal-agnostic by design, starting with Warp.

#Install

Install from the JetBrains Marketplace — in the IDE: Settings → Plugins → Marketplace, search for External Terminal Launcher.

#Supported terminals

#Usage

1. Settings → Tools → External Terminal
2. Pick your terminal, toggle Reuse existing window as a new tab, and optionally set a custom executable path.
3. Click the terminal button in the top toolbar (or Tools → Open External Terminal).

The terminal dropdown only lists emulators detected on the current system (plus your saved choice). Set a custom executable path to surface a terminal installed in a non-standard location.

No keyboard shortcut is bound by default — assign one under Settings → Keymap by searching for Open External Terminal.

#How it works

Each terminal is a TerminalProvider that, given the OS, an optional executable override, the project directory and the reuse-tab preference, produces a pure LaunchSpec (executable + args). TerminalLauncher resolves the configured provider, checks the binary is installed, and spawns it with GeneralCommandLine. Command construction is fully unit-tested per terminal and per OS.

#A note on Warp

On macOS/Linux Warp's warp:// URI scheme cannot carry a working directory, so the plugin invokes the binary with the directory as a positional argument instead. On Windows the binary parses its first argument as a URI — a bare path like C:\foo is rejected — so there the plugin passes Warp's documented warp://action/new_tab?path= deep link. When Warp is already running it reuses the existing window as a new tab on its own — there is no explicit flag for it.

#Development

./gradlew runIde          # launch a sandbox IDE with the plugin
./gradlew test            # run unit tests
./gradlew buildPlugin     # produce build/distributions/*.zip

• Kotlin + IntelliJ Platform Gradle Plugin 2.6.0
• Target: PhpStorm 2024.3 (since 243, until 263.*), JDK 17

#Adding a new terminal

1. Implement TerminalProvider in terminal/ (return null from launchSpec for unsupported OSes).
2. Register it in TerminalRegistry.providers.
3. Add provider tests to TerminalProviderTest.

#License

See LICENSE.