Take advantage of screen
2015-10-04 20:53
Some advantages of using screen:
- Multiplexing, Using multiple windows (running/debugging, editor, version control, etc)
- De-coupled from desktop window manager
- Persistence, possible to detach/reattach sessions
- Easily accessible remotely via SSH
- Able to share screen sessions with others over SSH
Here's a short list of some useful keyboard shortcuts for screen to release some of its power.
Key Action Notes
Ctrl+a c new window
Ctrl+a n next window
Ctrl+a p previous window
Ctrl+a " select window from list
Ctrl+a Ctrl+a previous window viewed
Ctrl+a A Re-name window
Ctrl+a S split terminal horizontally into regions Ctrl+a c to create new window there
Ctrl+a | split terminal vertically into regions Requires screen >= 4.1
Ctrl+a :resize resize region
Ctrl+a :fit fit screen size to new terminal size Ctrl+a F is the same. Do after resizing xterm
Ctrl+a :remove remove region Ctrl+a X is the same
Ctrl+a tab Move to next region
Ctrl+a d detach screen from terminal Start screen with -r option to reattach
Ctrl+a A set window title
Ctrl+a x lock session Enter user password to unlock
Ctrl+a esc enter scrollback/copy mode Ctrl+a [ is the same., esc to escape back to
normal mode or enter/space to mark text to copy
Ctrl+a ] paste buffer Supports pasting between windows
Ctrl+a > write paste buffer to file useful for copying between screens
Ctrl+a < read paste buffer from file useful for pasting between screens
Ctrl+a ? show key bindings/command names Note unbound commands only in man page
Ctrl+a : goto screen command prompt up shows last command entered
Note: screen has its own scrollback buffer seperate from your terminal emulator such as xterm or rxvt. It is accessible through the copy/scrollback mode reachable by ctrl+a esc. In this mode a vi-like editor is active. Use esc escape back to normal mode.