Linux – ctrl + r in linux / ubuntu terminal command line

Here's something to play with in Bash.

To set it up:

$ bash    # try this in a subshell since ^C seems to cause it to exit
$ f () { sed "1s/^/$(tput cup 0 0)/;s/^/$(tput il1)/"; }
$ PROMPT_COMMAND='tput cup 0 0;tput il1; echo'
$ exec > >(f)

Press enter one extra time and it's ready to try. Sometimes the output and the prompt are out of order and there may be other weirdness, but it's kind of an interesting thing to try.

Screen oriented programs won't work because they don't see a tty.

In gnome terminal, you can edit the keyboard shortcuts with Edit -> Reset Shortcuts... You can then map the command "Reset and Clear", which seems to do what you're looking for.

Alternatively, you can limit the scrollback history to a small number (say 0) and Ctrl+L will be closer to what you are looking for.