Background

ttyx_ uses a GTK+ 3 widget called VTE (Virtual Terminal Emulator), originally built as the back-end for GNOME Terminal and now used by most GTK-based terminal emulators including ttyx_.

VTE relies on a helper script — typically /etc/profile.d/vte.sh — to hook the shell’s PROMPT_COMMAND and emit terminal control codes that tell the emulator what directory the shell is in. Earlier VTE versions read this from /proc/<pid>/cwd, but that approach had reliability issues, so VTE moved to the script-based approach.

The catch: different distributions treat /etc/profile.d/ differently. On Fedora, scripts there run for both login and non-login shells; on Ubuntu and Arch, they only run for login shells. Since most terminal emulators — including ttyx_ — don’t launch shells as login shells by default, the VTE hook never fires.

Impact

When the VTE helper doesn’t run, the current directory stops being reported. Concretely: splitting a terminal in ttyx_ opens the split in your home directory instead of inheriting the parent’s cwd.

Fixing it

Pick whichever is easiest.

Option 1 — Use the bundled ttyx_ integration script

ttyx_ ships its own integration script at /usr/share/ttyx/scripts/ttyx_int.sh that does the same job as vte.sh: it hooks PROMPT_COMMAND to emit OSC 7 sequences telling the emulator the shell’s cwd. Source it from your rc file:

# ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc
. /usr/share/ttyx/scripts/ttyx_int.sh

This is also the recommended approach for remote hosts over SSH.

Option 2 — Source vte.sh manually

Add this to ~/.bashrc (or ~/.zshrc):

if [ "$TTYX_ID" ] || [ "$TILIX_ID" ] || [ "$VTE_VERSION" ]; then
    source /etc/profile.d/vte.sh
fi

On older Ubuntu releases a symlink may be missing:

sudo ln -s /etc/profile.d/vte-2.91.sh /etc/profile.d/vte.sh

If you use a custom PROMPT_COMMAND instead of simply overriding PS1, your PROMPT_COMMAND needs to append working-directory information. Calling __vte_osc7 (defined by vte-2.91.sh) does this:

function custom_prompt() {
  __git_ps1 "\[\033[0;31m\]\u \[\033[0;36m\]\h:\w\[\033[00m\]" " \n\[\033[0;31m\]>\[\033[00m\] " " %s"
  VTE_PWD_THING="$(__vte_osc7)"
  PS1="$PS1$VTE_PWD_THING"
}
PROMPT_COMMAND=custom_prompt

Option 3 — Run the shell as a login shell

Enable Preferences → Profile → Command → Run command as login shell. Login shells run /etc/profile.d/* scripts on any distribution, so this fixes the issue at the cost of running your full login environment every time you open a terminal.