what terminal does linux use in text only mode?

[rm-rf]

Sometimes the text only mode terminal crashes on me. So I
wanted to be able to kill it and restart it from the GUI. I tried
using ps x, and that didn't show it. I tried using

echo "$TERM"

but it returned "linux", I had thought linux was just a kernel. So is it a part of the linux kernel, or is it a separate program?

[Rubberman]

The TERM environment only shows what the terminal type is, not the terming program. Generally for Linux the terminal program is bash (the bourne again shell - bash), an updated version of the Unix sh program. So, try this: ps -aef | grep -i bash

[rm-rf]

No I'm not talking about the shell, I am talking about the terminal. what is the filename of the program that is letting me talk to the shell?

[jayd512]

That would be bash for the console.
And the name of a GUI terminal window depends on your WM.
Most commonly, it's xterm.

Is that what you mean?

[Rubberman]

As jayd512 said, it can be xterm, or gnome-terminal - there are a number of terminal programs. These are two of the more common ones. Again, the TERM environment variable is NOT the type of terminal, but what capabilities it will use, which it gets from the termcap database. The xterm and linux types are versions of the ansi terminal protocols, based originally on the DEC vt100 terminal.

[rm-rf]

Is that what you mean?

yes, but why would they make bash go to the screen directly?
It makes more sense for the only way to interact with it to be to use a terminal, because that saves space on servers where you would only login with ssh (that way you don't need to have any
fonts loaded on it)