Option to keep output from linux terminal startup file.

[mforbes]

Currently, when using startup files for a linux terminal (*.term), the output of the startup file is cleared when the terminal is first started.

Could an option be provided to keep some of this output?

Note: the output does remain when restarting the terminal with ctrl-d, but vanishes upon the first invocation, or when the clear button (☠️) is pressed.

Use Case

I use terminal to run various servers, such as nikola auto for building a website, sphinx-autobuild for building documentation. With the current behaviour, if there is any sort of error, then the clearing of the terminal clears the error message, making it look like there is no startup file. This makes it challenging to debug, and is confusing for new users who expect the terminal to do something.

I also sometimes use the startup files for running a script whose output is useful – like judging entries in a programming competition.

Suggestion

Perhaps the terminal clearing could be included at the end of the default startup-file template? This way people could customize what gets displayed, and what is kept hidden. It would also make ctrl-d behaviour consistent with clear (☠️), although I am not 100% convinced that this consistency would be desirable. (I did not know about ctrl-d keeping the output until recently, but it would give a way of debugging the portion of a startup file before the clearing... though it would be easy to disable this in the startup file, so I think this is not a good reason for keeping the difference.)