Terminal: Strange terminal behavior with special characters over SSH from WSL to Ubuntu server

[saidaspen]

Short description

Whenever I connect to a Ubuntu server from my Windows machine, inside of of Ubuntu installed in Windows Subsystem for Linux the terminal is acting very strangely.

Whenever I try to edit a line which contains dash (-) or plus (+) and possibly also other similar special characters then the terminal seems to be unable to insert any text prior to that character.

Let me show you. In this case I go back in command history using up-arrow, but that is not needed. Same thing happens if I just go back to start of line, either with CTRL-A or by means of arrow keys.

This happens when I go WSL (Ubuntu 16.04) -> SSH -> (Ubuntu 16.04) (tried against two different remote Ubuntu hosts).
It does not happen if I go from for example Git Bash in Windows over SSH to the same server. Nor does it happen if I go from a computer with Mac OS over SSH to the same server.

Example

Build and setup

• Windows build number: Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.16299.309]
• Local Linux (in WSL): Ubuntu 16.04.4 LTS
• Remove Linux: Ubuntu 16.04.4 LTS

PS and Locale

Local machine

$echo "$PS1"
\[\033]0;:/home/said\007\]\n\[\033[32m\]\u@\h \[\033[35m\] \[\033[33m\]\w\[\033[36m\]\[\033[0m\]\n$

$locale
LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LANGUAGE=
LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_NUMERIC="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_TIME="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MONETARY="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_PAPER="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_NAME="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ADDRESS="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ALL=

Remote machine

: echo "$PS1"
\[\033[38;5;2m\]\h\[\]\[\033[38;5;29m\] \[\]\[\033[38;5;11m\]\w\[\]\[\033[38;5;15m\]\n: \[\]

: locale
LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LANGUAGE=
LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_NUMERIC="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_TIME="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MONETARY="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_PAPER="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_NAME="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ADDRESS="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ALL=

[zadjii-msft]

God bless you this is a great bug writeup ❤️

I'll file a bug and take a look.

[zadjii-msft]

Hey sorry for the delays in investigating, I have a pretty long bug backlog.

Any chance I could get the output of infocmp on both the host and the remote machine?

On the bright side, I don't think your PS1 has anything to do with it, though it does seem like the Remote PS! has some extraneous \[\] pairs in there - Are those there for a specific reason? I'd think they don't do anything unless there's something inside them...

[saidaspen]

I did some more testing that I probably should have done up front.

I experimented using different PS1, no difference.
export PS1=": "
and then testing to not setting PS1 at all.
First only on the local machine, then on both local and remote machine - no difference, behavior still there.

You mentioned infocmp got me to test remove export TERM=xterm-color from my ~/.bash_profile on the remote host. That fixes the problem!

infocmp on remote machine with TERM=xterm-color (problem)

said@Taurasi:~$ infocmp
#       Reconstructed via infocmp from file: /lib/terminfo/x/xterm-color
xterm-color|generic "ANSI" color xterm (X Window System),
        am, km, mir, msgr, xenl,
        colors#8, cols#80, it#8, lines#24, ncv@, pairs#64,
        acsc=``aaffggiijjkkllmmnnooppqqrrssttuuvvwwxxyyzz{{||}}~~,
        bel=^G, bold=\E[1m, clear=\E[H\E[2J, cr=^M,
        csr=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dr, cub=\E[%p1%dD, cub1=^H,
        cud=\E[%p1%dB, cud1=^J, cuf=\E[%p1%dC, cuf1=\E[C,
        cup=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dH, cuu=\E[%p1%dA, cuu1=\E[A,
        dch=\E[%p1%dP, dch1=\E[P, dl=\E[%p1%dM, dl1=\E[M, ed=\E[J,
        el=\E[K, enacs=\E)0, home=\E[H, ht=^I, hts=\EH, il=\E[%p1%dL,
        il1=\E[L, ind=^J,
        is2=\E[m\E[?7h\E[4l\E>\E7\E[r\E[?1;3;4;6l\E8,
        kbs=\177, kcub1=\EOD, kcud1=\EOB, kcuf1=\EOC, kcuu1=\EOA,
        kdch1=\E[3~, kf1=\E[11~, kf10=\E[21~, kf11=\E[23~,
        kf12=\E[24~, kf13=\E[25~, kf14=\E[26~, kf15=\E[28~,
        kf16=\E[29~, kf17=\E[31~, kf18=\E[32~, kf19=\E[33~,
        kf2=\E[12~, kf20=\E[34~, kf3=\E[13~, kf4=\E[14~,
        kf5=\E[15~, kf6=\E[17~, kf7=\E[18~, kf8=\E[19~, kf9=\E[20~,
        kfnd=\E[1~, kich1=\E[2~, kmous=\E[M, knp=\E[6~, kpp=\E[5~,
        kslt=\E[4~, meml=\El, memu=\Em, op=\E[m, rc=\E8, rev=\E[7m,
        ri=\EM, rmacs=^O, rmcup=\E[2J\E[?47l\E8, rmir=\E[4l,
        rmkx=\E[?1l\E>, rmso=\E[m, rmul=\E[m,
        rs2=\E[m\E[?7h\E[4l\E>\E7\E[r\E[?1;3;4;6l\E8, sc=\E7,
        setab=\E[4%p1%dm, setaf=\E[3%p1%dm, sgr0=\E[m, smacs=^N,
        smcup=\E7\E[?47h, smir=\E[4h, smkx=\E[?1h\E=, smso=\E[7m,
        smul=\E[4m, tbc=\E[3g, u6=\E[%i%d;%dR, u7=\E[6n,
        u8=\E[?1;2c, u9=\E[c,

infocmp on remote machine without TERM=xterm-color (no problem)

said@Taurasi:~$ infocmp
#       Reconstructed via infocmp from file: /lib/terminfo/x/xterm-256color
xterm-256color|xterm with 256 colors,
        am, bce, ccc, km, mc5i, mir, msgr, npc, xenl,
        colors#256, cols#80, it#8, lines#24, pairs#32767,
        acsc=``aaffggiijjkkllmmnnooppqqrrssttuuvvwwxxyyzz{{||}}~~,
        bel=^G, blink=\E[5m, bold=\E[1m, cbt=\E[Z, civis=\E[?25l,
        clear=\E[H\E[2J, cnorm=\E[?12l\E[?25h, cr=^M,
        csr=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dr, cub=\E[%p1%dD, cub1=^H,
        cud=\E[%p1%dB, cud1=^J, cuf=\E[%p1%dC, cuf1=\E[C,
        cup=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dH, cuu=\E[%p1%dA, cuu1=\E[A,
        cvvis=\E[?12;25h, dch=\E[%p1%dP, dch1=\E[P, dim=\E[2m,
        dl=\E[%p1%dM, dl1=\E[M, ech=\E[%p1%dX, ed=\E[J, el=\E[K,
        el1=\E[1K, flash=\E[?5h$<100/>\E[?5l, home=\E[H,
        hpa=\E[%i%p1%dG, ht=^I, hts=\EH, ich=\E[%p1%d@,
        il=\E[%p1%dL, il1=\E[L, ind=^J, indn=\E[%p1%dS,
        initc=\E]4;%p1%d;rgb\:%p2%{255}%*%{1000}%/%2.2X/%p3%{255}%*%{1000}%/%2.2X/%p4%{255}%*%{1000}%/%2.2X\E\\,
        invis=\E[8m, is2=\E[!p\E[?3;4l\E[4l\E>, kDC=\E[3;2~,
        kEND=\E[1;2F, kHOM=\E[1;2H, kIC=\E[2;2~, kLFT=\E[1;2D,
        kNXT=\E[6;2~, kPRV=\E[5;2~, kRIT=\E[1;2C, kb2=\EOE,
        kbs=\177, kcbt=\E[Z, kcub1=\EOD, kcud1=\EOB, kcuf1=\EOC,
        kcuu1=\EOA, kdch1=\E[3~, kend=\EOF, kent=\EOM, kf1=\EOP,
        kf10=\E[21~, kf11=\E[23~, kf12=\E[24~, kf13=\E[1;2P,
        kf14=\E[1;2Q, kf15=\E[1;2R, kf16=\E[1;2S, kf17=\E[15;2~,
        kf18=\E[17;2~, kf19=\E[18;2~, kf2=\EOQ, kf20=\E[19;2~,
        kf21=\E[20;2~, kf22=\E[21;2~, kf23=\E[23;2~,
        kf24=\E[24;2~, kf25=\E[1;5P, kf26=\E[1;5Q, kf27=\E[1;5R,
        kf28=\E[1;5S, kf29=\E[15;5~, kf3=\EOR, kf30=\E[17;5~,
        kf31=\E[18;5~, kf32=\E[19;5~, kf33=\E[20;5~,
        kf34=\E[21;5~, kf35=\E[23;5~, kf36=\E[24;5~,
        kf37=\E[1;6P, kf38=\E[1;6Q, kf39=\E[1;6R, kf4=\EOS,
        kf40=\E[1;6S, kf41=\E[15;6~, kf42=\E[17;6~,
        kf43=\E[18;6~, kf44=\E[19;6~, kf45=\E[20;6~,
        kf46=\E[21;6~, kf47=\E[23;6~, kf48=\E[24;6~,
        kf49=\E[1;3P, kf5=\E[15~, kf50=\E[1;3Q, kf51=\E[1;3R,
        kf52=\E[1;3S, kf53=\E[15;3~, kf54=\E[17;3~,
        kf55=\E[18;3~, kf56=\E[19;3~, kf57=\E[20;3~,
        kf58=\E[21;3~, kf59=\E[23;3~, kf6=\E[17~, kf60=\E[24;3~,
        kf61=\E[1;4P, kf62=\E[1;4Q, kf63=\E[1;4R, kf7=\E[18~,
        kf8=\E[19~, kf9=\E[20~, khome=\EOH, kich1=\E[2~,
        kind=\E[1;2B, kmous=\E[M, knp=\E[6~, kpp=\E[5~,
        kri=\E[1;2A, mc0=\E[i, mc4=\E[4i, mc5=\E[5i, meml=\El,
        memu=\Em, op=\E[39;49m, rc=\E8, rev=\E[7m, ri=\EM,
        rin=\E[%p1%dT, ritm=\E[23m, rmacs=\E(B, rmam=\E[?7l,
        rmcup=\E[?1049l, rmir=\E[4l, rmkx=\E[?1l\E>, rmso=\E[27m,
        rmul=\E[24m, rs1=\Ec, rs2=\E[!p\E[?3;4l\E[4l\E>, sc=\E7,
        setab=\E[%?%p1%{8}%<%t4%p1%d%e%p1%{16}%<%t10%p1%{8}%-%d%e48;5;%p1%d%;m,
        setaf=\E[%?%p1%{8}%<%t3%p1%d%e%p1%{16}%<%t9%p1%{8}%-%d%e38;5;%p1%d%;m,
        sgr=%?%p9%t\E(0%e\E(B%;\E[0%?%p6%t;1%;%?%p5%t;2%;%?%p2%t;4%;%?%p1%p3%|%t;7%;%?%p4%t;5%;%?%p7%t;8%;m,
        sgr0=\E(B\E[m, sitm=\E[3m, smacs=\E(0, smam=\E[?7h,
        smcup=\E[?1049h, smir=\E[4h, smkx=\E[?1h\E=, smso=\E[7m,
        smul=\E[4m, tbc=\E[3g, u6=\E[%i%d;%dR, u7=\E[6n,
        u8=\E[?1;2c, u9=\E[c, vpa=\E[%i%p1%dd,

[zadjii-msft]

Fantastic! Glad to hear I could help! It must have been unhappy with emitting 256 colors while not set in xterm-256color. Good to know for future reference.