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screen
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screen
- screen manager with VT100/ANSI terminal emulation
screen [ options ] [ cmd [ args ] ]
screen -r [[pid.]tty[.host]]
screen -r sessionowner/[[pid.]tty[.host]]
Before you begin to use screen
you'll need to make sure you have correctly selected your terminal type, just as you would for any other termcap/terminfo program. (You can do this by using tset
for example.)
If you're impatient and want to get started without doing a lot more reading, you should remember this one command: “C-a ?
”. Typing these two characters will display a list of the available screen
commands and their bindings. Each keystroke is discussed in the section “Default Key Bindings”. The manual section “Customization” deals with the contents of your .screenrc.
If your terminal is a “true” auto-margin terminal (it doesn't allow the last position on the screen to be updated without scrolling the screen) consider using a version of your terminal's termcap that has automatic margins turned off. This will ensure an accurate and optimal update of the screen in all circumstances. Most terminals nowadays have “magic” margins (automatic margins plus usable last column). This is the VT100 style type and perfectly suited for screen
. If all you've got is a “true” auto-margin terminal screen
will be content to use it, but updating a character put into the last position on the screen may not be possible until the screen scrolls or the character is moved into a safe position in some other way. This delay can be shortened by using a terminal with insert-character capability.
See Command-Line Options.
See Default Key Bindings.
screen
displays informational messages and other diagnostics in a message line. While this line is distributed to appear at the bottom of the screen, it can be defined to appear at the top of the screen during compilation. If your terminal has a status line defined in its termcap, screen
will use this for displaying its messages, otherwise a line of the current screen will be temporarily overwritten and output will be momentarily interrupted. The message line is automatically removed after a few seconds delay, but it can also be removed early (on terminals without a status line) by beginning to type.
The message line facility can be used by an application running in the current window by means of the ANSI Privacy message control sequence. For instance, from within the shell, try something like:
echo '<esc>^Hello world from window '$WINDOW'<esc>\\'
where <esc>
is an escape, ^
is a literal up-arrow, and \\
turns into a single backslash.
See Window Types.
See String Escapes.
See Flow-Control.
See Titles.
See The Virtual Terminal.
See Input Translation.
$SYSSCREENRC /etc/screenrc | screen initialization commands |
$SCREENRC $HOME/.screenrc | Read in after /etc/screenrc |
$SCREENDIR/S-<login> /var/run/screen/S-<login> | Socket directories (default) |
/usr/tmp/screens/S-<login> | Alternate socket directories. |
<socket directory>/.termcap | Written by the termcap output function |
/usr/tmp/screens/screen-exchange /tmp/screen-exchange | screen 'interprocess communication buffer' |
hardcopy.[0-9] | Screen images created by the hardcopy function |
screenlog.[0-9] | Output log files created by the log function |
/usr/lib/terminfo/?/* /etc/termcap | Terminal capability databases |
/var/run/utmp | Login records |
$LOCKPRG | Program that locks a terminal. |
termcap(5)
, utmp(5)
, vi(1)
, captoinfo(1)
, tic(1)
Originally created by Oliver Laumann, this latest version was produced by Wayne Davison, Juergen Weigert and Michael Schroeder.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program (see the file COPYING); if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA
This is version 4.0.2. Its roots are a merge of a custom version 2.3PR7 by Wayne Davison and several enhancements to Oliver Laumann's version 2.0. Note that all versions numbered 2.x are copyright by Oliver Laumann.
The latest official release of screen
available via anonymous ftp from ftp://gnudist.gnu.org, ftp://nic.funet.fi or any other GNU distribution site. The home site of screen is ftp://ftp.uni-erlangen.de, in the directory pub/utilities/screen. The subdirectory `private' contains the latest beta testing release. If you want to help, send a note to screen@uni-erlangen.de.
'dm
' (delete mode) and 'xs
' are not handled correctly (they are ignored). 'xn
' is treated as a magic-margin indicator.screen
has no clue about double-high or double-wide characters. But this is the only area where vttest
is allowed to fail.screen
does not make use of hardware tabs.screen
must be installed as set-uid with owner root on most systems in order to be able to correctly change the owner of the tty device file for each window. Special permission may also be required to write the file “/var/run/utmp”.screen
is killed with SIGKILL. This will cause some programs (like “w
” or “rwho”
) to advertise that a user is logged on who really isn't.screen
may give a strange warning when your tty has no utmp entry.screen
may not automatically detach (or quit) unless the device driver is configured to send a HANGUP signal. To detach a screen
session use the -D or -d command line option.breaktype
” and “defbreaktype
” change the break generating method used by all terminal devices. The first should change a window specific setting, where the latter should change only the default for new windows.