Open an Interactive Terminal

Open shell sessions into the containers of a running pod from the Operator canvas, and know what the terminal can and cannot do.
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The interactive terminal opens a shell inside a running container without leaving the Operator canvas. Use it for last-mile diagnosis that logs and status cannot answer: testing connectivity from inside a pod, reading a mounted file, or checking an injected environment variable. It is a browser-based equivalent of kubectl exec, scoped to the resource you selected.

  • Operator mode on a Meshery you run. The hosted kanvas.new site does not offer Operator mode. See How Kanvas Works with Meshery and Layer5 Cloud.
  • A connected cluster with Meshery Operator deployed. Meshery Operator runs MeshSync and a message broker in the cluster. MeshSync executes the shell, and Meshery Server relays input and output through the broker. If any of the three is unavailable, the terminal does not connect (see Failure modes).
  • A running container whose image contains /bin/sh. Distroless images have no shell and cannot be used.

The action is named Initiate Terminal Session and is offered on Pod and Container resources only. Right-click the resource on the canvas, or select it and use the action in the header of the Details panel. The session starts immediately and the terminal panel opens at the bottom left of the canvas. There is no separate connect step.

What opens depends on what you selected:

You selectSessions opened
A podOne session per container in the pod’s containers list, each in its own tab. Init and ephemeral containers are not included. There is no prompt to choose a container.
A containerOne session for that container.

A node with an active session shows a terminal badge. Selecting the badge reopens the panel.

Each tab is one shell session. The panel is draggable, minimizable to a dock icon with a session count, and keeps its scrollback (10,000 lines). Closing the panel with the close button hides it and leaves the sessions running. The trash icon on a tab ends that tab’s session and removes the tab. Leaving Operator mode closes the panel.

The terminal edits your input in the browser and sends it to the container when you press Enter:

KeyBehavior
Printable keys, BackspaceEdit the current line locally.
EnterSends the whole line to the shell.
Up, DownWalk the history of lines typed in this tab.
Ctrl+CSends an interrupt to the running command.
TabInserts four spaces. It does not trigger shell completion.
Other Ctrl, Alt, and Meta combinationsIgnored.

Because input is line-based and the remote terminal is not resized when you resize the panel, commands that take over the screen, such as vim, top, and less, do not work. Use commands that print and exit: ls, cat, env, ps aux, curl, nslookup.

The search icon in the panel header opens a search field with next and previous controls for finding text in the scrollback.

ItemBehavior
Sessions per containerOne live session per container per user. Starting a second session for the same container does nothing and opens no new tab.
Concurrent sessions overallNo limit is enforced.
Different usersEach user gets an independent session, even on the same container.
ShellFixed to /bin/sh with a terminal attached. No bash fallback and no shell selection.
Identity in the containerThe exec call runs with MeshSync’s own Kubernetes access, not a per-user Kubernetes identity. Anyone who can open a terminal has the reach of the workload’s container, so treat access to this action as access to the container.
Idle timeout, maximum durationNone.
ReconnectNone. If the connection between your browser and Meshery Server drops, the tab stays on screen but is dead. Close the tab and start a new session.

Kanvas does not hide or disable the action based on role or plan. The permission model lists View Interactive Terminal as an Operator capability for the Team Operator plan and above. See Permissions by Role and Feature Availability for the current role and plan matrix.

SymptomCause and fix
Panel shows Failed to create terminal session with a reasonThe Kanvas extension could not be loaded by Meshery. The reason names the cause, for example a plugin built for a different Meshery version than the one you run. Install matching versions.
Toast No container found to create term sessionThe selected component lists no containers.
Empty tab, no promptMeshery Server could not reach MeshSync. Confirm the cluster shows as connected and that the broker is connected. Kanvas does not display the server’s error text for terminal sessions.
Prompt never appears, or the shell prints an errorThe container has no /bin/sh, is not in the Running phase, or was deleted. Errors raised while MeshSync opens the shell print in the terminal itself.
Session goes quiet after exit or a pod restartThe session ended on the cluster. Kanvas shows no closed message. Close the tab and start a new session.

For cluster connection problems, see Troubleshoot Kanvas.

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Last modified October 15, 2026: docs(kanvas): operator - terminal, logs, performance tests, views, resource details, Operator concepts (6b54fd3038a)