Be more efficient with screen

I’m a fan of app-misc/screen. If you have an alternative screen multiplexer, feel free to move along. If not, here is the most basic of introductions. First, install screen.

emerge -av app-misc/screen

Next, even before starting your first session, run the following to add a “caption” to the bottom of your sessions. Think of this like a status bar.

echo 'caption always "%{= kw}%-w%{= BW}%n %t%{-}%+w %-= %{y}@%H %{r}%1`%{w}| %{g}%l %{w} | %{y}%m/%d/%Y %c %{w}"' >> /etc/screenrc

Great, now you can start your first session. Screen has a bunch of flags. The only screen command you’ll need (almost ever) is the following:

screen -DR

Great. look in the lower right-hand corner of your terminal. You should see something like: @HOSTNAME | 0.00 0.00 0.00 | DATE TIME. In the lower left-hand corner you should see 0 USER@HOSTNAME.

If you stop here, I would argue you’re still WAY ahead of where you were before screen. Why? If your connection drops for whatever reason, ssh back in and run screen -DR again – you’re back.

Commands Screen commands look like this [ctrl-a][command] which is hit control and “a” together, then release, then type the command.

[ctrl-a][double quote] show windows
[ctrl-a] create new window
[ctrl-a][space] cycle to next window
[ctrl-a][d] detach from screen (and processes continue)

There you go. That should get you started.