Why is the default terminal width 80 characters?

Question

80 seems to be the default in many different environments and I\'m looking for a technical or historical reason. It is common knowledge that lines of code shouldn\'t exceed 80 c

Answer 1

One of the characteristics of good typography is properly set measure - length of the line of characters.

There is an optimum width for a Measure and that is defined by the amount of characters are in the line. A general good rule of thumb is 2-3 alphabets in length, or 52-78 characters (including spaces).

It simply makes sense to make your text readable.

See Five simple steps to better typography for more info.