Screen

Screen is a very useful UNIX utility that you can use to multiplex several terminals within a single window. Before I started using it, I frequently lost the terminal window I wanted and had a bad habit of starting a new window everytime I wanted to do something new. Now that I use screen, when I’m developing, I keep certain numbered terminals open so I can switch easily between them (Ctrl-A n). For example, when I am developing an application in Ruby on Rails, I use the following convention:

^ Ctrl-A n ^ Use ^ ^ 0 | My server (WEBRick) | ^ 1 | Primary command line with [ssh-agent]] started and my [subversion key loaded | ^ 2 | Secondary command line | ^ 3 | MySQL command line | ^ 4 | tailed log (tail -f logs/development.log) | ^ 5 | Rails console (ruby script/console) | ^ 6 - 9 | General use depending on what I am doing |

By using screen, gvim with multiple buffers and Firefox, I only really need three windows open at once.

Commands I use most

Create a new screen Ctrl-a c

Switch to screen n Ctrl-a {n}

List Windows Ctrl-a ”

Name window Ctrl-a A

Kill window Ctrl-a K

Detach Ctrl-a d

Reattach screen -r

Reattach even if attached elsewhere screen -D -RR

Copy mode Ctrl-a [

Paste Ctrl-a ]

Split Ctrl-a S

Switch Ctrl-a w

Full Screen Ctrl-a Q

Name a screen session screen -S <session_name>

In copy mode

Scroll up Ctrl-u

Scoll down Ctrl-d

Select:

Andrew McDonough is a consultant CTO and software developer, currently based between Berlin and London.

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