Support for VT100 Console Mode

VT100 is a video terminal that dates back to 1978. You might wonder why PHP adds support for something as old as this? The answer is that even today, console applications understand a defined set of ANSI escape sequences that, among other things, allow you to add color to your output. PHPUnit, for example, optionally uses colors to highlight the test results in the console output. And yes, there also is a blink functionality …

Before PHP 7, Windows did not support those ANSI escape codes, so PHP users on Windows could not get colored or otherwise fancy console output. Windows 10, starting with build 10586, has added support for ANSI escape sequences, so as of PHP 7.2, those will also work on Windows 10. Unfortunately, older Windows versions are still out of luck.