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NAME
screen - screen manager with VT100/ANSI terminal emulation
SYNOPSIS
screen [ -options ] [ cmd [ args ] ]
screen -r [[pid.]tty[.host]]
screen -r sessionowner/[[pid.]tty[.host]]
DESCRIPTION
Screen is a full-screen window manager that multiplexes a physical
terminal between several processes (typically interactive shells).
Each virtual terminal provides the functions of a DEC VT100 terminal
and, in addition, several control functions from the ISO 6429 (ECMA
48, ANSI X3.64) and ISO 2022 standards (e.g. insert/delete line and
support for multiple character sets). There is a scrollback history
buffer for each virtual terminal and a copy-and-paste mechanism that
allows moving text regions between windows.
When screen is called, it creates a single window with a shell in it
(or the specified command) and then gets out of your way so that you
can use the program as you normally would. Then, at any time, you can
create new (full-screen) windows with other programs in them
(including more shells), kill existing windows, view a list of
windows, turn output logging on and off, copy-and-paste text between
windows, view the scrollback history, switch between windows in
whatever manner you wish, etc. All windows run their programs
completely independent of each other. Programs continue to run when
their window is currently not visible and even when the whole screen
session is detached from the user's terminal. When a program
terminates, screen (per default) kills the window that contained it.
If this window was in the foreground, the display switches to the
previous window; if none are left, screen exits. Shells usually
distinguish between running as login-shell or sub-shell. Screen runs
them as sub-shells, unless told otherwise (See "shell" .screenrc
command).
Everything you type is sent to the program running in the current
window. The only exception to this is the one keystroke that is used
to initiate a command to the window manager. By default, each command
begins with a control-a (abbreviated C-a from now on), and is followed
by one other keystroke. The command character and all the key
bindings can be fully customized to be anything you like, though they
are always two characters in length.
Screen does not understand the prefix "C-" to mean control, although
this notation is used in this manual for readability. Please use the
caret notation ("^A" instead of "C-a") as arguments to e.g. the escape
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command or the -e option. Screen will also print out control
characters in caret notation.
The standard way to create a new window is to type "C-a c". This
creates a new window running a shell and switches to that window
immediately, regardless of the state of the process running in the
current window. Similarly, you can create a new window with a custom
command in it by first binding the command to a keystroke (in your
.screenrc file or at the "C-a :" command line) and then using it just
like the "C-a c" command. In addition, new windows can be created by
running a command like:
screen emacs prog.c
from a shell prompt within a previously created window. This will not
run another copy of screen, but will instead supply the command name
and its arguments to the window manager (specified in the $STY
environment variable) who will use it to create the new window. The
above example would start the emacs editor (editing prog.c) and switch
to its window. - Note that you cannot transport environment variables
from the invoking shell to the application (emacs in this case),
because it is forked from the parent screen process, not from the
invoking shell.
If "/etc/utmp" is writable by screen, an appropriate record will be
written to this file for each window, and removed when the window is
terminated. This is useful for working with "talk", "script",
"shutdown", "rsend", "sccs" and other similar programs that use the
utmp file to determine who you are. As long as screen is active on
your terminal, the terminal's own record is removed from the utmp
file. See also "C-a L".
GETTING STARTED
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
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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.
COMMAND-LINE OPTIONS
Screen has the following command-line options:
-a include all capabilities (with some minor exceptions) in each
window's termcap, even if screen must redraw parts of the display
in order to implement a function.
-A Adapt the sizes of all windows to the size of the current
terminal. By default, screen tries to restore its old window
sizes when attaching to resizable terminals (those with "WS" in
its description, e.g. suncmd or some xterm).
-c file
override the default configuration file from "$HOME/.screenrc" to
file.
-d|-D [pid.tty.host]
does not start screen, but detaches the elsewhere running screen
session. It has the same effect as typing "C-a d" from screen's
controlling terminal. -D is the equivalent to the power detach
key. If no session can be detached, this option is ignored. In
combination with the -r/-R option more powerful effects can be
achieved:
-d -r Reattach a session and if necessary detach it first.
-d -R Reattach a session and if necessary detach or even create it
first.
-d -RR Reattach a session and if necessary detach or create it. Use
the first session if more than one session is available.
-D -r Reattach a session. If necessary detach and logout remotely
first.
-D -R Attach here and now. In detail this means: If a session is
running, then reattach. If necessary detach and logout
remotely first. If it was not running create it and notify
the user. This is the author's favorite.
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-D -RR Attach here and now. Whatever that means, just do it.
Note: It is always a good idea to check the status of your
sessions by means of "screen -list".
-e xy
specifies the command character to be x and the character
generating a literal command character to y (when typed after the
command character). The default is "C-a" and `a', which can be
specified as "-e^Aa". When creating a screen session, this
option sets the default command character. In a multiuser session
all users added will start off with this command character. But
when attaching to an already running session, this option changes
only the command character of the attaching user. This option is
equivalent to either the commands "defescape" or "escape"
respectively.
-f, -fn, and -fa
turns flow-control on, off, or "automatic switching mode". This
can also be defined through the "defflow" .screenrc command.
-h num
Specifies the history scrollback buffer to be num lines high.
-i will cause the interrupt key (usually C-c) to interrupt the
display immediately when flow-control is on. See the "defflow"
.screenrc command for details. The use of this option is
discouraged.
-l and -ln
turns login mode on or off (for /etc/utmp updating). This can
also be defined through the "deflogin" .screenrc command.
-ls [match]
-list [match]
does not start screen, but prints a list of pid.tty.host strings
identifying your screen sessions. Sessions marked `detached' can
be resumed with "screen -r". Those marked `attached' are running
and have a controlling terminal. If the session runs in multiuser
mode, it is marked `multi'. Sessions marked as `unreachable'
either live on a different host or are `dead'. An unreachable
session is considered dead, when its name matches either the name
of the local host, or the specified parameter, if any. See the
-r flag for a description how to construct matches. Sessions
marked as `dead' should be thoroughly checked and removed. Ask
your system administrator if you are not sure. Remove sessions
with the -wipe option.
-L tells screen to turn on automatic output logging for the windows.
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-Logfile file
By default logfile name is "screenlog.0". You can set new logfile
name with the "-Logfile" option.
-m causes screen to ignore the $STY environment variable. With
"screen -m" creation of a new session is enforced, regardless
whether screen is called from within another screen session or
not. This flag has a special meaning in connection with the `-d'
option:
-d -m Start screen in "detached" mode. This creates a new session
but doesn't attach to it. This is useful for system startup
scripts.
-D -m This also starts screen in "detached" mode, but doesn't fork a
new process. The command exits if the session terminates.
-O selects a more optimal output mode for your terminal rather than
true VT100 emulation (only affects auto-margin terminals without
`LP'). This can also be set in your .screenrc by specifying `OP'
in a "termcap" command.
-p number_or_name|-|=|+
Preselect a window. This is useful when you want to reattach to a
specific window or you want to send a command via the "-X" option
to a specific window. As with screen's select command, "-"
selects the blank window. As a special case for reattach, "="
brings up the windowlist on the blank window, while a "+" will
create a new window. The command will not be executed if the
specified window could not be found.
-q Suppress printing of error messages. In combination with "-ls"
the exit value is as follows: 9 indicates a directory without
sessions. 10 indicates a directory with running but not
attachable sessions. 11 (or more) indicates 1 (or more) usable
sessions. In combination with "-r" the exit value is as follows:
10 indicates that there is no session to resume. 12 (or more)
indicates that there are 2 (or more) sessions to resume and you
should specify which one to choose. In all other cases "-q" has
no effect.
-Q Some commands now can be queried from a remote session using this
flag, e.g. "screen -Q windows". The commands will send the
response to the stdout of the querying process. If there was an
error in the command, then the querying process will exit with a
non-zero status.
The commands that can be queried now are:
echo
info
lastmsg
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number
select
time
title
windows
-r [pid.tty.host]
-r sessionowner/[pid.tty.host]
resumes a detached screen session. No other options (except
combinations with -d/-D) may be specified, though an optional
prefix of [pid.]tty.host may be needed to distinguish between
multiple detached screen sessions. The second form is used to
connect to another user's screen session which runs in multiuser
mode. This indicates that screen should look for sessions in
another user's directory. This requires setuid-root.
-R resumes screen only when it's unambiguous which one to attach,
usually when only one screen is detached. Otherwise lists
available sessions. -RR attempts to resume the first detached
screen session it finds. If successful, all other command-line
options are ignored. If no detached session exists, starts a new
session using the specified options, just as if -R had not been
specified. The option is set by default if screen is run as a
login-shell (actually screen uses "-xRR" in that case). For
combinations with the -d/-D option see there.
-s program
sets the default shell to the program specified, instead of the
value in the environment variable $SHELL (or "/bin/sh" if not
defined). This can also be defined through the "shell" .screenrc
command. See also there.
-S sessionname
When creating a new session, this option can be used to specify a
meaningful name for the session. This name identifies the session
for "screen -list" and "screen -r" actions. It substitutes the
default [tty.host] suffix.
-t name
sets the title (a.k.a.) for the default shell or specified
program. See also the "shelltitle" .screenrc command.
-T term
Set the $TERM environment variable using the specified term as
opposed to the default setting of screen.
-U Run screen in UTF-8 mode. This option tells screen that your
terminal sends and understands UTF-8 encoded characters. It also
sets the default encoding for new windows to `utf8'.
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-v Print version number.
-wipe [match]
does the same as "screen -ls", but removes destroyed sessions
instead of marking them as `dead'. An unreachable session is
considered dead, when its name matches either the name of the
local host, or the explicitly given parameter, if any. See the
-r flag for a description how to construct matches.
-x Attach to a not detached screen session. (Multi display mode).
Screen refuses to attach from within itself. But when cascading
multiple screens, loops are not detected; take care.
-X Send the specified command to a running screen session. You may
use the -S option to specify the screen session if you have
several screen sessions running. You can use the -d or -r option
to tell screen to look only for attached or detached screen
sessions. Note that this command doesn't work if the session is
password protected.
-4 Resolve hostnames only to IPv4 addresses.
-6 Resolve hostnames only to IPv6 addresses.
DEFAULT KEY BINDINGS
As mentioned, each screen command consists of a "C-a" followed by one
other character. For your convenience, all commands that are bound to
lower-case letters are also bound to their control character
counterparts (with the exception of "C-a a"; see below), thus, "C-a c"
as well as "C-a C-c" can be used to create a window. See section
"CUSTOMIZATION" for a description of the command.
The following table shows the default key bindings. The trailiing
commas in boxes with multiple keystroke entries are separators, not
part of the bindings. allbox tab(;); lb l l. C-a ';(select);T{
Prompt for a window name or number to switch to. T} C-a
[dq];(windowlist -b);T{ Present a list of all windows for selection.
T} C-a digit;(select 0-9);T{ Switch to window number 0 - 9 T} C-a
-;(select -);T{ Switch to window number 0 - 9, or to the blank window.
T} C-a tab;(focus);T{ Switch the input focus to the next region. See
also split, remove, only. T} C-a C-a;(other);T{ Toggle to the window
displayed previously. Note that this binding defaults to the command
character typed twice, unless overridden. For instance, if you use
the option "-e]x", this command becomes "]]". T} C-a a ;(meta);T{
Send the command character (C-a) to window. See escape command. T}
C-a A;(title);T{ Allow the user to enter a name for the current
window. T} T{ C-a b,
C-a C-b T};(break);T{ Send a break to window. T} C-a B;(pow_break);T{
Reopen the terminal line and send a break. T} T{ C-a c,
C-a C-c T};(screen);T{ Create a new window with a shell and switch to
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that window. T} C-a C;(clear);T{ Clear the screen. T} T{ C-a d,
C-a C-d T};(detach);T{ Detach screen from this terminal. T} C-a D
D;(pow_detach);T{ Detach and logout. T} T{ C-a f,
C-a C-f T};(flow);T{ Toggle flow on, off or auto. T} C-a F;(fit);T{
Resize the window to the current region size. T} C-a C-g;(vbell);T{
Toggles screen's visual bell mode. T} C-a h;(hardcopy);T{ Write a
hardcopy of the current window to the file "hardcopy.n". T} C-a
H;(log);T{ Begins/ends logging of the current window to the file
"screenlog.n". T} T{ C-a i,
C-a C-i T};(info);T{ Show info about this window. T} T{ C-a k,
C-a C-k T};(kill);T{ Destroy current window. T} T{ C-a l,
C-a C-l T};(redisplay);T{ Fully refresh current window. T} C-a
L;(login);T{ Toggle this windows login slot. Available only if screen
is configured to update the utmp database. T{ C-a m,
C-a C-m T};(lastmsg);T{ Repeat the last message displayed in the
message line. T} C-a M;(monitor);T{ Toggles monitoring of the current
window. T} T{ C-a space,
C-a n,
C-a C-n T};(next);T{ Switch to the next window. T} C-a N;(number);T{
Show the number (and title) of the current window. T} T{ C-a
backspace,
C-a C-h,
C-a p,
C-a C-p T};(prev);T{ Switch to the previous window (opposite of C-a
n). T} T{ C-a q,
C-a C-q T};(xon);T{ Send a control-q to the current window. T} C-a
Q;(only);T{ Delete all regions but the current one. See also split,
remove, focus. T} T{ C-a r,
C-a C-r T};(wrap);T{ Toggle the current window's line-wrap setting
(turn the current window's automatic margins on and off). T} T{ C-a
s,
C-a C-s; T};(xoff);T{ Send a control-s to the current window. T} C-a
S;(split);T{ Split the current region horizontally into two new ones.
See also only, remove, focus. T} T{ C-a t,
C-a C-t T};(time);T{ Show system information. T} C-a v;(version);T{
Display the version and compilation date. T} C-a C-v;(digraph);T{
Enter digraph. T} T{ C-a w,
C-a C-w T};(windows);T{ Show a list of window. T} C-a W;(width);T{
Toggle 80/132 columns. T} C-a x or C-a C-x;(lockscreen);T{ Lock this
terminal. T} C-a X ;(remove);T{ Kill the current region. See also
split, only, focus. T} T{ C-a z,
C-a C-z T};(suspend);T{ Suspend screen. Your system must support
BSD-style job-control. T} C-a Z;(reset);T{ Reset the virtual terminal
to its "power-on" values. T} C-a .;(dumptermcap);T{ Write out a
".termcap" file. T} C-a ?;(help);T{ Show key bindings. T} C-a
\;(quit);T{ Kill all windows and terminate screen. T} C-a
:;(colon);T{ Enter command line mode. T} T{ C-a [,
C-a C-[,
C-a esc T};(copy);T{ Enter copy/scrollback mode. T} T{ C-a C-],
C-a ] T};(paste .);T{ Write the contents of the paste buffer to the
stdin queue of the current window. T} T{ C-a {,
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C-a } T};(history);T{ Copy and paste a previous (command) line. T}
C-a >;(writebuf);T{ Write paste buffer to a file. T} C-a
<;(readbuf);T{ Reads the screen-exchange file into the paste buffer.
T} C-a =;(removebuf);T{ Removes the file used by C-a < and C-a >. T}
C-a ,;(license);T{ Shows where screen comes from, where it went to and
why you can use it. T} C-a _;(silence);T{ Start/stop monitoring the
current window for inactivity. T} C-a |;(split -v);T{ Split the
current region vertically into two new ones. T} C-a *;(displays);T{
Show a listing of all currently attached displays. T}
CUSTOMIZATION
The "socket directory" defaults either to $HOME/.screen or simply to
/tmp/screens or preferably to /usr/local/screens chosen at compile-
time. If screen is installed setuid-root, then the administrator
should compile screen with an adequate (not NFS mounted) socket
directory. If screen is not running setuid-root, the user can specify
any mode 700 directory in the environment variable $SCREENDIR.
When screen is invoked, it executes initialization commands from the
files "/usr/local/etc/screenrc" and ".screenrc" in the user's home
directory. These are the "programmer's defaults" that can be
overridden in the following ways: for the global screenrc file screen
searches for the environment variable $SYSSCREENRC (this override
feature may be disabled at compile-time). The user specific screenrc
file is searched in $SCREENRC, then $HOME/.screenrc. The command line
option -c takes precedence over the above user screenrc files.
Commands in these files are used to set options, bind functions to
keys, and to automatically establish one or more windows at the
beginning of your screen session. Commands are listed one per line,
with empty lines being ignored. A command's arguments are separated
by tabs or spaces, and may be surrounded by single or double quotes.
A `#' turns the rest of the line into a comment, except in quotes.
Unintelligible lines are warned about and ignored. Commands may
contain references to environment variables. The syntax is the shell-
like "$VAR " or "${VAR}". Note that this causes incompatibility with
previous screen versions, as now the '$'-character has to be protected
with '\' if no variable substitution shall be performed. A string in
single-quotes is also protected from variable substitution.
Two configuration files are shipped as examples with your screen
distribution: "etc/screenrc" and "etc/etcscreenrc". They contain a
number of useful examples for various commands.
Customization can also be done 'on-line'. To enter the command mode
type `C-a :'. Note that commands starting with "def" change default
values, while others change current settings.
The following commands are available:
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acladd usernames [crypted-pw]
addacl usernames
Enable users to fully access this screen session. Usernames can be one
user or a comma separated list of users. This command enables to
attach to the screen session and performs the equivalent of `aclchg
usernames +rwx "#?"'. executed. To add a user with restricted access,
use the `aclchg' command below. If an optional second parameter is
supplied, it should be a crypted password for the named user(s).
`Addacl' is a synonym to `acladd'. Multi user mode only.
aclchg usernames permbits list
chacl usernames permbits list
Change permissions for a comma separated list of users. Permission
bits are represented as `r', `w' and `x'. Prefixing `+' grants the
permission, `-' removes it. The third parameter is a comma separated
list of commands and/or windows (specified either by number or title).
The special list `#' refers to all windows, `?' to all commands. if
usernames consists of a single `*', all known users are affected.
A command can be executed when the user has the `x' bit for it. The
user can type input to a window when he has its `w' bit set and no
other user obtains a writelock for this window. Other bits are
currently ignored. To withdraw the writelock from another user in
window 2: `aclchg username -w+w 2'. To allow read-only access to the
session: `aclchg username -w "#"'. As soon as a user's name is known
to screen he can attach to the session and (per default) has full
permissions for all command and windows. Execution permission for the
acl commands, `at' and others should also be removed or the user may
be able to regain write permission. Rights of the special username
nobody cannot be changed (see the "su" command). `Chacl' is a synonym
to `aclchg'. Multi user mode only.
acldel username
Remove a user from screen's access control list. If currently
attached, all the user's displays are detached from the session. He
cannot attach again. Multi user mode only.
aclgrp username [groupname]
Creates groups of users that share common access rights. The name of
the group is the username of the group leader. Each member of the
group inherits the permissions that are granted to the group leader.
That means, if a user fails an access check, another check is made for
the group leader. A user is removed from all groups the special value
"none" is used for groupname. If the second parameter is omitted all
groups the user is in are listed.
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aclumask [[ users ] +bits | [ users ] -bits... ]
umask [[ users ] +bits | [ users ] -bits... ]
This specifies the access other users have to windows that will be
created by the caller of the command. Users may be no, one or a comma
separated list of known usernames. If no users are specified, a list
of all currently known users is assumed. Bits is any combination of
access control bits allowed defined with the "aclchg" command. The
special username "?" predefines the access that not yet known users
will be granted to any window initially. The special username "??"
predefines the access that not yet known users are granted to any
command. Rights of the special username nobody cannot be changed (see
the "su" command). `Umask' is a synonym to `aclumask'.
activity message
When any activity occurs in a background window that is being
monitored, screen displays a notification in the message line. The
notification message can be re-defined by means of the "activity"
command. Each occurrence of `%' in message is replaced by the number
of the window in which activity has occurred, and each occurrence of
`^G' is replaced by the definition for bell in your termcap (usually
an audible bell). The default message is
'Activity in window %n'
Note that monitoring is off for all windows by default, but can be
altered by use of the "monitor" command (C-a M).
allpartial on|off
If set to on, only the current cursor line is refreshed on window
change. This affects all windows and is useful for slow terminal
lines. The previous setting of full/partial refresh for each window is
restored with "allpartial off". This is a global flag that
immediately takes effect on all windows overriding the "partial"
settings. It does not change the default redraw behavior of newly
created windows.
altscreen on|off
If set to on, "alternate screen" support is enabled in virtual
terminals, just like in xterm. Initial setting is `off'.
at [identifier][#|*|%] command [args
Execute a command at other displays or windows as if it had been
entered there. "At" changes the context (the `current window' or
`current display' setting) of the command. If the first parameter
describes a non-unique context, the command will be executed multiple
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times. If the first parameter is of the form `identifier*' then
identifier is matched against user names. The command is executed
once for each display of the selected user(s). If the first parameter
is of the form `identifier%' identifier is matched against displays.
Displays are named after the ttys they attach. The prefix `/dev/' or
`/dev/tty' may be omitted from the identifier. If identifier has a
`#' or nothing appended it is matched against window numbers and
titles. Omitting an identifier in front of the `#', `*' or `%'-
character selects all users, displays or windows because a prefix-
match is performed. Note that on the affected display(s) a short
message will describe what happened. Permission is checked for
initiator of the "at" command, not for the owners of the affected
display(s). Note that the '#' character works as a comment introducer
when it is preceded by whitespace. This can be escaped by prefixing a
'\'. Permission is checked for the initiator of the "at" command, not
for the owners of the affected display(s).
Caveat: When matching against windows, the command is executed at
least once per window. Commands that change the internal arrangement
of windows (like "other") may be called again. In shared windows the
command will be repeated for each attached display. Beware, when
issuing toggle commands like "login"! Some commands (e.g. "process")
require that a display is associated with the target windows. These
commands may not work correctly under "at" looping over windows.
attrcolor attrib [attribute/color-modifier]
This command can be used to highlight attributes by changing the color
of the text. If the attribute attrib is in use, the specified
attribute/color modifier is also applied. If no modifier is given, the
current one is deleted. See the "STRING ESCAPES" chapter for the
syntax of the modifier. Screen understands two pseudo-attributes, "i"
stands for high-intensity foreground color and "I" for high-intensity
background color.
Examples:
attrcolor b "R"
Change the color to bright red if bold text is to be printed.
attrcolor u "-u b"
Use blue text instead of underline.
attrcolor b ".I"
Use bright colors for bold text. Most terminal emulators do this
already.
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attrcolor i "+b"
Make bright colored text also bold.
autodetach on|off
Sets whether screen will automatically detach upon hangup, which saves
all your running programs until they are resumed with a screen -r
command. When turned off, a hangup signal will terminate screen and
all the processes it contains. Autodetach is on by default.
autonuke on|off
Sets whether a clear screen sequence should nuke all the output that
has not been written to the terminal. See also "obuflimit".
backtick id lifespan autorefresh cmd args_
backtick id
Program the backtick command with the numerical id id. The output of
such a command is used for substitution of the "%`" string escape. The
specified lifespan is the number of seconds the output is considered
valid. After this time, the command is run again if a corresponding
string escape is encountered. The autorefresh parameter triggers an
automatic refresh for caption and hardstatus strings after the
specified number of seconds. Only the last line of output is used for
substitution.
If both the lifespan and the autorefresh parameters are zero, the
backtick program is expected to stay in the background and generate
output once in a while. In this case, the command is executed right
away and screen stores the last line of output. If a new line gets
printed screen will automatically refresh the hardstatus or the
captions.
The second form of the command deletes the backtick command with the
numerical id id.
bce [on|off]
Change background-color-erase setting. If "bce" is set to on, all
characters cleared by an erase/insert/scroll/clear operation will be
displayed in the current background color. Otherwise the default
background color is used.
bell_msg [message]
When a bell character is sent to a background window, screen displays
a notification in the message line. The notification message can be
re-defined by this command. Each occurrence of `%' in message is
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replaced by the number of the window to which a bell has been sent,
and each occurrence of `^G' is replaced by the definition for bell in
your termcap (usually an audible bell). The default message is
'Bell in window %n'
An empty message can be supplied to the "bell_msg" command to suppress
output of a message line (bell_msg ""). Without parameter, the
current message is shown.
bind [class] key [
Bind a command to a key. By default, most of the commands provided by
screen are bound to one or more keys as indicated in the "DEFAULT KEY
BINDINGS" section, e.g. the command to create a new window is bound to
"C-c" and "c". The "bind" command can be used to redefine the key
bindings and to define new bindings. The key argument is either a
single character, a two-character sequence of the form "^x" (meaning
"C-x"), a backslash followed by an octal number (specifying the ASCII
code of the character), or a backslash followed by a second character,
such as "\^" or "\\". The argument can also be quoted, if you like.
If no further argument is given, any previously established binding
for this key is removed. The command argument can be any command
listed in this section.
If a command class is specified via the "-c" option, the key is bound
for the specified class. Use the "command" command to activate a
class. Command classes can be used to create multiple command keys or
multi-character bindings.
Some examples:
bind ' ' windows
bind ^k
bind k
bind K kill
bind ^f screen telnet foobar
bind \033 screen -ln -t root -h 1000 9 su
would bind the space key to the command that displays a list of
windows (so that the command usually invoked by "C-a C-w" would also
be available as "C-a space"). The next three lines remove the default
kill binding from "C-a C-k" and "C-a k". "C-a K" is then bound to the
kill command. Then it binds "C-f" to the command "create a window with
a TELNET connection to foobar", and bind "escape" to the command that
creates an non-login window with a.k.a. "root" in slot #9, with a
superuser shell and a scrollback buffer of 1000 lines.
bind -c demo1 0 select 10
bind -c demo1 1 select 11
bind -c demo1 2 select 12
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bindkey "^B" command -c demo1
makes "C-b 0" select window 10, "C-b 1" window 11, etc.
bind -c demo2 0 select 10
bind -c demo2 1 select 11
bind -c demo2 2 select 12
bind - command -c demo2
makes "C-a - 0" select window 10, "C-a - 1" window 11, etc.
bindkey [-d] [-m] [
This command manages screen's input translation tables. Every entry in
one of the tables tells screen how to react if a certain sequence of
characters is encountered. There are three tables: one that should
contain actions programmed by the user, one for the default actions
used for terminal emulation and one for screen's copy mode to do
cursor movement. See section "INPUT TRANSLATION" for a list of default
key bindings.
If the -d option is given, bindkey modifies the default table, -m
changes the copy mode table and with neither option the user table is
selected. The argument string is the sequence of characters to which
an action is bound. This can either be a fixed string or a termcap
keyboard capability name (selectable with the -k option).
Some keys on a VT100 terminal can send a different string if
application mode is turned on (e.g the cursor keys). Such keys have
two entries in the translation table. You can select the application
mode entry by specifying the -a option.
The -t option tells screen not to do inter-character timing. One
cannot turn off the timing if a termcap capability is used.
Cmd can be any of screen's commands with an arbitrary number of args.
If cmd is omitted the key-binding is removed from the table.
Here are some examples of keyboard bindings:
bindkey -d
Show all of the default key bindings. The application mode entries are
marked with [A].
bindkey -k k1 select 1
Make the "F1" key switch to window one.
bindkey -t foo stuff barfoo
Make "foo" an abbreviation of the word "barfoo". Timeout is disabled
so that users can type slowly.
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bindkey "\024" mapdefault
This key-binding makes "^T" an escape character for key-bindings. If
you did the above "stuff barfoo" binding, you can enter the word "foo"
by typing "^Tfoo". If you want to insert a "^T" you have to press the
key twice (i.e., escape the escape binding).
bindkey -k F1 command
Make the F11 (not F1!) key an alternative screen escape (besides ^A).
break[duration]
Send a break signal for duration*0.25 seconds to this window. For
non-Posix systems the time interval may be rounded up to full seconds.
Most useful if a character device is attached to the window rather
than a shell process (See also chapter "WINDOW TYPES"). The maximum
duration of a break signal is limited to 15 seconds.
blanker
Activate the screen blanker. First the screen is cleared. If no
blanker program is defined, the cursor is turned off, otherwise, the
program is started and it's output is written to the screen. The
screen blanker is killed with the first keypress, the read key is
discarded.
This command is normally used together with the "idle" command.
blankerprg [program-args]
Defines a blanker program. Disables the blanker program if an empty
argument is given. Shows the currently set blanker program if no
arguments are given.
breaktype [tcsendbreak|TIOCSBRK|
Choose one of the available methods of generating a break signal for
terminal devices. This command should affect the current window only.
But it still behaves identical to "defbreaktype". This will be changed
in the future. Calling "breaktype" with no parameter displays the
break method for the current window.
bufferfile [exchange-file]
Change the filename used for reading and writing with the paste
buffer. If the optional argument to the "bufferfile" command is
omitted, the default setting ("/tmp/screen-exchange") is reactivated.
The following example will paste the system's password file into the
screen window (using the paste buffer, where a copy remains):
C-a : bufferfile /etc/passwd
C-a < C-a ]
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C-a : bufferfile
bumpleft
Swaps window with previous one on window list.
bumpright
Swaps window with next one on window list.
c1 [on|off]
Change c1 code processing. "C1 on" tells screen to treat the input
characters between 128 and 159 as control functions. Such an 8-bit
code is normally the same as ESC followed by the corresponding 7-bit
code. The default setting is to process c1 codes and can be changed
with the "defc1" command. Users with fonts that have usable characters
in the c1 positions may want to turn this off.
caption [ top | bottom ] always|splitonly[string]
caption string [string]
This command controls the display of the window captions. Normally a
caption is only used if more than one window is shown on the display
(split screen mode). But if the type is set to always screen shows a
caption even if only one window is displayed. The default is
splitonly.
The second form changes the text used for the caption. You can use all
escapes from the "STRING ESCAPES" chapter. Screen uses a default of
`%3n %t'.
You can mix both forms by providing a string as an additional
argument.
You can have the caption displayed either at the top or bottom of the
window. The default is bottom.
charset set
Change the current character set slot designation and charset mapping.
The first four character of set are treated as charset designators
while the fifth and sixth character must be in range '0' to '3' and
set the GL/GR charset mapping. On every position a '.' may be used to
indicate that the corresponding charset/mapping should not be changed
(set is padded to six characters internally by appending '.' chars).
New windows have "BBBB02" as default charset, unless a "encoding"
command is active.
The current setting can be viewed with the "info" command.
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chdir [directory]
Change the current directory of screen to the specified directory or,
if called without an argument, to your home directory (the value of
the environment variable $HOME). All windows that are created by
means of the "screen" command from within ".screenrc" or by means of
"C-a : screen " or "C-a c" use this as their default directory.
Without a chdir command, this would be the directory from which screen
was invoked.
Hardcopy and log files are always written to the window's default
directory, not the current directory of the process running in the
window. You can use this command multiple times in your .screenrc to
start various windows in different default directories, but the last
chdir value will affect all the windows you create interactively.
cjkwidth [ on | off ]
Treat ambiguous width characters as full/half width.
clear
Clears the current window and saves its image to the scrollback
buffer.
collapse
Reorders window on window list, removing number gaps between them.
colon [prefix]
Allows you to enter ".screenrc" command lines. Useful for on-the-fly
modification of key bindings, specific window creation and changing
settings. Note that the "set" keyword no longer exists! Usually
commands affect the current window rather than default settings for
future windows. Change defaults with commands starting with 'def'.
If you consider this as the `Ex command mode' of screen, you may
regard "C-a esc" (copy mode) as its `Vi command mode'.
command [-c class]
This command has the same effect as typing the screen escape character
(^A). It is probably only useful for key bindings. If the "-c" option
is given, select the specified command class. See also "bind" and
"bindkey".
compacthist [on|off]
This tells screen whether to suppress trailing blank lines when
scrolling up text into the history buffer.
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console [on|off]
Grabs or un-grabs the machines console output to a window. Note: Only
the owner of /dev/console can grab the console output. This command
is only available if the machine supports the ioctl TIOCCONS.
copy
Enter copy/scrollback mode. This allows you to copy text from the
current window and its history into the paste buffer. In this mode a
vi-like `full screen editor' is active:
The editor's movement keys are:
allbox tab(@); l l. T{ h, C-h,
left arrow T}@move the cursor left. T{ j, C-n,
down arrow T}@move the cursor down. T{ k, C-p,
up arrow T}@move the cursor up. T{ l ('el'),
right arrow T}@move the cursor right. 0 (zero) C-a@move to the
leftmost column. + and -@positions one line up and down. H, M and
L@T{ move the cursor to the leftmost column of the top, center or
bottom line of the window. T} |@moves to the specified absolute
column. g or home@moves to the beginning of the buffer. G or end@T{
moves to the specified absolute line (default: end of buffer). T}
%@jumps to the specified percentage of the buffer. ^ or $@T{ move to
the leftmost column, to the first or last non-whitespace character on
the line. T} w, b, and e@move the cursor word by word. B, E@move the
cursor WORD by WORD (as in vi). f/F, t/T@T{ move the cursor
forward/backward to the next occurence of the target. (eg, '3fy' will
move the cursor to the 3rd 'y' to the right.) T} ; and ,@T{ Repeat the
last f/F/t/T command in the same/opposite direction. T} C-e and C-
y@T{ scroll the display up/down by one line while preserving the
cursor position. T} C-u and C-d@T{ scroll the display up/down by the
specified amount of lines while preserving the cursor position.
(Default: half screen-full). T} C-b and C-f@scroll the display up/down
a full screen.
Note: Emacs style movement keys can be customized by a .screenrc
command. (E.g. markkeys "h=^B:l=^F:$=^E") There is no simple method
for a full emacs-style keymap, as this involves multi-character codes.
Some keys are defined to do mark and replace operations.
The copy range is specified by setting two marks. The text between
these marks will be highlighted. Press:
space or enter to set the first or second mark respectively. If
mousetrack is set to `on', marks can also be set using left mouse
click.
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Y and y used to mark one whole line or to mark from start of
line.
W marks exactly one word.
Any of these commands can be prefixed with a repeat count number by
pressing digits
0..9 which is taken as a repeat count.
Example: "C-a C-[ H 10 j 5 Y" will copy lines 11 to 15 into the paste
buffer.
The folllowing search keys are defined:
/ Vi-like search forward.
? Vi-like search backward.
C-a s Emacs style incremental search forward.
C-r Emacs style reverse i-search.
n Find next search pattern.
N Find previous search pattern.
There are however some keys that act differently than in vi. Vi does
not allow one to yank rectangular blocks of text, but screen does.
Press: c or C to set the left or right margin respectively. If no
repeat count is given, both default to the current cursor position.
Example: Try this on a rather full text screen:
"C-a [ M 20 l SPACE c 10 l 5 j C SPACE".
This moves one to the middle line of the screen, moves in 20 columns
left, marks the beginning of the paste buffer, sets the left column,
moves 5 columns down, sets the right column, and then marks the end of
the paste buffer. Now try:
"C-a [ M 20 l SPACE 10 l 5 j SPACE"
and notice the difference in the amount of text copied.
J joins lines. It toggles between 4 modes: lines separated by a
newline character (012), lines glued seamless, lines separated by a
single whitespace and comma separated lines. Note that you can prepend
the newline character with a carriage return character, by issuing a
"crlf on".
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v or V is for all the vi users with ":set numbers" - it toggles the
left margin between column 9 and 1. Press
a before the final space key to toggle in append mode. Thus the
contents of the paste buffer will not be overwritten, but is appended
to.
A toggles in append mode and sets a (second) mark.
> sets the (second) mark and writes the contents of the paste buffer
to the screen-exchange file (/tmp/screen-exchange per default) once
copy-mode is finished.
This example demonstrates how to dump the whole scrollback buffer to
that file: "C-A [ g SPACE G $ >".
C-g gives information about the current line and column.
x or o exchanges the first mark and the current cursor position. You
can use this to adjust an already placed mark.
C-l ('el') will redraw the screen.
@ does nothing. Does not even exit copy mode.
All keys not described here exit copy mode.
copy_reg [key]
No longer exists, use "readreg" instead.
crlf [on|off]
This affects the copying of text regions with the `C-a [' command. If
it is set to `on', lines will be separated by the two character
sequence `CR' - `LF'. Otherwise (default) only `LF' is used. When no
parameter is given, the state is toggled.
debug on|off
Turns runtime debugging on or off. If screen has been compiled with
option -DDEBUG debugging available and is turned on per default. Note
that this command only affects debugging output from the main "SCREEN"
process correctly. Debug output from attacher processes can only be
turned off once and forever.
defc1 on|off
Same as the c1 command except that the default setting for new windows
is changed. Initial setting is `on'.
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defautonuke on|off
Same as the autonuke command except that the default setting for new
displays is changed. Initial setting is `off'. Note that you can use
the special `AN' terminal capability if you want to have a dependency
on the terminal type.
defbce on|off
Same as the bce command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
defbreaktype [tcsendbreak|TIOCSBRK|
Choose one of the available methods of generating a break signal for
terminal devices. The preferred methods are tcsendbreak and TIOCSBRK.
The third, TCSBRK, blocks the complete screen session for the duration
of the break, but it may be the only way to generate long breaks.
Tcsendbreak and TIOCSBRK may or may not produce long breaks with
spikes (e.g. 4 per second). This is not only system-dependent, this
also differs between serial board drivers. Calling "defbreaktype"
with no parameter displays the current setting.
defcharset [set]
Like the charset command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Shows current default if called without argument.
defdynamictitle on|off
Set default behaviour for new windows regarding if screen should
change window title when seeing proper escape sequence. See also
"TITLES (naming windows)" section.
defescape xy
Set the default command characters. This is equivalent to the "escape"
except that it is useful multiuser sessions only. In a multiuser
session "escape" changes the command character of the calling user,
where "defescape" changes the default command characters for users
that will be added later.
defflow on|off|auto
Same as the flow command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `auto'. Specifying "defflow
auto interrupt" is the same as the command-line options -fa and -i.
defgr on|off
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Same as the gr command except that the default setting for new windows
is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
defhstatus [status]
The hardstatus line that all new windows will get is set to status.
This command is useful to make the hardstatus of every window display
the window number or title or the like. Status may contain the same
directives as in the window messages, but the directive escape
character is '^E' (octal 005) instead of '%'. This was done to make a
misinterpretation of program generated hardstatus lines impossible.
If the parameter status is omitted, the current default string is
displayed. Per default the hardstatus line of new windows is empty.
defencoding enc
Same as the encoding command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is the encoding taken from the
terminal.
deflog on|off
Same as the log command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
deflogin on|off
Same as the login command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. This is initialized with `on' as distributed (see
config.h.in).
defmode mode
The mode of each newly allocated pseudo-tty is set to mode. Mode is
an octal number. When no "defmode" command is given, mode 0622 is
used.
defmonitor on|off
Same as the monitor command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
defmousetrack on|off
Same as the mousetrack command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
defnonblock on|off|numsecs
Same as the nonblock command except that the default setting for
displays is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
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defobuflimit limit
Same as the obuflimit command except that the default setting for new
displays is changed. Initial setting is 256 bytes. Note that you can
use the special 'OL' terminal capability if you want to have a
dependency on the terminal type.
defscrollback num
Same as the scrollback command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is 100.
defshell command
Synonym to the shell .screenrc command. See there.
defsilence on|off
Same as the silence command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `off'.
defslowpaste msec
Same as the slowpaste command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is 0 milliseconds, meaning `off'.
defutf8 on|off
Same as the utf8 command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initial setting is `on' if screen was started with
"-U", otherwise `off'.
defwrap on|off
Same as the wrap command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initially line-wrap is on and can be toggled with
the "wrap" command ("C-a r") or by means of "C-a : wrap on|off".
defwritelock on|off|auto
Same as the writelock command except that the default setting for new
windows is changed. Initially writelocks will off.
defzombie [keys]
Synonym to the zombie command. Both currently change the default. See
there.
detach [-h]
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Detach the screen session (disconnect it from the terminal and put it
into the background). This returns you to the shell where you invoked
screen. A detached screen can be resumed by invoking screen with the
-r option (see also section "COMMAND-LINE OPTIONS"). The -h option
tells screen to immediately close the connection to the terminal
("hangup").
dinfo
Show what screen thinks about your terminal. Useful if you want to
know why features like color or the alternate charset don't work.
displays
Shows a tabular listing of all currently connected user front-ends
(displays). This is most useful for multiuser sessions. The
following keys can be used in displays list:
allbox tab(@); l l. k, C-p, or up@Move up one line. j, C-n, or
down@Move down one line. C-a or home@Move to the first line. C-e or
end@Move to the last line. C-u or C-d@Move one half page up or down.
C-b or C-f@Move one full page up or down. mouseclick@T{ Move to the
selected line. Available when "mousetrack" is set to on. T}
space@Refresh the list d@Detach that display D@Power detach that
display C-g, enter, or escape@Exit the list
The following is an example of what "displays" could look like:
xterm 80x42 jnweiger@/dev/ttyp4 0(m11) &rWx
facit 80x24 mlschroe@/dev/ttyhf nb 11(tcsh) rwx
xterm 80x42 jnhollma@/dev/ttyp5 0(m11) &R.x
(A) (B) (C) (D) (E) (F)(G) (H)(I)
The legend is as follows:
(A) The terminal type known by screen for this display.
(B) Displays geometry as width x height.
(C) Username who is logged in at the display.
(D) Device name of the display or the attached device
(E) Display is in blocking or nonblocking mode. The available modes
are "nb", "NB", "Z<", "Z>", and "BL".
(F) Number of the window
(G) Name/title of window
(H) Whether the window is shared
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(I) Window permissions. Made up of three characters:
(1st character)
- : no read
r : read
R : read only due to foreign wlock
(2nd character)
- : no write
. : write suppressed by foreign wlock
w : write
W : own wlock
(3rd character)
- : no execute
x : execute
"Displays" needs a region size of at least 10 characters
wide and 5 characters high in order to display.
digraph [preset[unicode-value]]
This command prompts the user for a digraph sequence. The next
two characters typed are looked up in a builtin table and the
resulting character is inserted in the input stream. For example,
if the user enters 'a"', an a-umlaut will be inserted. If the
first character entered is a 0 (zero), screen will treat the
following characters (up to three) as an octal number instead.
The optional argument preset is treated as user input, thus one
can create an "umlaut" key. For example the command "bindkey ^K
digraph '"'" enables the user to generate an a-umlaut by typing
CTRL-K a. When a non-zero unicode-value is specified, a new
digraph is created with the specified preset. The digraph is
unset if a zero value is provided for the unicode-value.
dumptermcap
Write the termcap entry for the virtual terminal optimized for
the currently active window to the file ".termcap" in the user's
"$HOME/.screen" directory (or wherever screen stores its sockets.
See the "FILES" section below). This termcap entry is identical
to the value of the environment variable $TERMCAP that is set up
by screen for each window. For terminfo based systems you will
need to run a converter like captoinfo and then compile the entry
with tic.
dynamictitle on|off
Change behaviour for windows regarding if screen should change
window title when seeing proper escape sequence. See also "TITLES
(naming windows)" section.
echo [-n] message
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The echo command may be used to annoy screen users with a
'message of the day'. Typically installed in a global
/local/etc/screenrc. The option "-n" may be used to suppress the
line feed. See also "sleep". Echo is also useful for online
checking of environment variables.
encoding enc [enc]
Tell screen how to interpret the input/output. The first argument
sets the encoding of the current window. Each window can emulate
a different encoding. The optional second parameter overwrites
the encoding of the connected terminal. It should never be needed
as screen uses the locale setting to detect the encoding. There
is also a way to select a terminal encoding depending on the
terminal type by using the "KJ" termcap entry.
Supported encodings are eucJP, SJIS, eucKR, eucCN, Big5, GBK,
KOI8-R, KOI8-U, CP1251, UTF-8, ISO8859-2, ISO8859-3, ISO8859-4,
ISO8859-5, ISO8859-6, ISO8859-7, ISO8859-8, ISO8859-9, ISO8859-
10, ISO8859-15, jis.
See also "defencoding", which changes the default setting of a
new window.
escape xy
Set the command character to x and the character generating a
literal command character (by triggering the "meta" command) to y
(similar to the -e option). Each argument is either a single
character, a two-character sequence of the form "^x" (meaning
"C-x"), a backslash followed by an octal number (specifying the
ASCII code of the character), or a backslash followed by a second
character, such as "\^" or "\\". The default is "^Aa".
eval command1[command2 ]
Parses and executes each argument as separate command.
exec [[fdpat]newcommand [
Run a unix subprocess (specified by an executable path newcommand
and its optional arguments) in the current window. The flow of
data between newcommands stdin/stdout/stderr, the process
originally started in the window (let us call it "application-
process") and screen itself (window) is controlled by the file
descriptor pattern fdpat. This pattern is basically a three
character sequence representing stdin, stdout and stderr of
newcommand. A dot (.) connects the file descriptor to screen. An
exclamation mark (!) causes the file descriptor to be connected
to the application-process. A colon (:) combines both. User
input will go to newcommand unless newcommand receives the
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application-process' output (fdpats first character is `!' or
`:') or a pipe symbol (|) is added (as a fourth character) to the
end of fdpat.
Invoking `exec' without arguments shows name and arguments of the
currently running subprocess in this window. Only one subprocess
a time can be running in each window.
When a subprocess is running the `kill' command will affect it
instead of the windows process.
Refer to the postscript file `doc/fdpat.ps' for a confusing
illustration of all 21 possible combinations. Each drawing shows
the digits 2,1,0 representing the three file descriptors of
newcommand. The box marked `W' is the usual pty that has the
application-process on its slave side. The box marked `P' is the
secondary pty that now has screen at its master side.
Abbreviations: Whitespace between the word `exec' and fdpat and
the command can be omitted. Trailing dots and a fdpat consisting
only of dots can be omitted. A simple `|' is synonymous for the
pattern `!..|'; the word exec can be omitted here and can always
be replaced by `!'.
Examples:
exec /bin/sh
exec /bin/sh
!/bin/sh
Creates another shell in the same window, while the
original shell is still running. Output of both shells
is displayed and user input is sent to the new /bin/sh.
exec !.. stty 19200
exec ! stty 19200
!!stty 19200
Set the speed of the window's tty. If your stty command
operates on stdout, then add another `!'.
exec !..| less
|less
This adds a pager to the window output. The special
character `|' is needed to give the user control over
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the pager although it gets its input from the window's
process. This works, because less listens on stderr (a
behavior that screen would not expect without the `|')
when its stdin is not a tty. Less versions newer than
177 fail miserably here; good old pg still works.
!:sed -n s/.*Error.*/\007/p
Sends window output to both, the user and the sed
command. The sed inserts an additional bell character
(oct. 007) to the window output seen by screen. This
will cause "Bell in window x" messages, whenever the
string "Error" appears in the window.
fit
Change the window size to the size of the current region. This
command is needed because screen doesn't adapt the window size
automatically if the window is displayed more than once.
flow [on|off|auto]
Sets the flow-control mode for this window. Without parameters
it cycles the current window's flow-control setting from
"automatic" to "on" to "off". See the discussion on "FLOW-
CONTROL" later on in this document for full details and note,
that this is subject to change in future releases. Default is
set by `defflow'.
focus [up|down|
Move the input focus to the next region. This is done in a cyclic
way so that the top region is selected after the bottom one. If
no subcommand is given it defaults to `down'. `up' cycles in the
opposite order, `top' and `bottom' go to the top and bottom
region respectively. Useful bindings are (j and k as in vi)
bind j focus down
bind k focus up
bind t focus top
bind b focus bottom
Note that k is traditionally bound to the kill command.
focusminsize [ ( width|max|_ ) ( height|max|_ ) ]
This forces any currently selected region to be automatically
resized at least a certain width and height. All other
surrounding regions will be resized in order to accommodate.
This constraint follows everytime the "focus" command is used.
The "resize" command can be used to increase either dimension of
a region, but never below what is set with "focusminsize". The
underscore `_' is a synonym for max. Setting a width and height
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of `0 0' (zero zero) will undo any constraints and allow for
manual resizing. Without any parameters, the minimum width and
height is shown.
gr [on|off]
Turn GR charset switching on/off. Whenever screen sees an input
character with the 8th bit set, it will use the charset stored in
the GR slot and print the character with the 8th bit stripped.
The default (see also "defgr") is not to process GR switching
because otherwise the ISO88591 charset would not work.
group [grouptitle]
Change or show the group the current window belongs to. Windows
can be moved around between different groups by specifying the
name of the destination group. Without specifying a group, the
title of the current group is displayed.
hardcopy [-h] [file]
Writes out the currently displayed image to the file file, or, if
no filename is specified, to hardcopy.n in the default directory,
where n is the number of the current window. This either appends
or overwrites the file if it exists. See below. If the option -h
is specified, dump also the contents of the scrollback buffer.
hardcopy_append on|off
If set to "on", screen will append to the "hardcopy.n" files
created by the command "C-a h", otherwise these files are
overwritten each time. Default is `off'.
hardcopydir directory
Defines a directory where hardcopy files will be placed. If
unset, hardcopys are dumped in screen's current working
directory.
hardstatus [on|off]
hardstatus [always]firstline|lastline|message|
hardstatus string[string]
This command configures the use and emulation of the terminal's
hardstatus line. The first form toggles whether screen will use
the hardware status line to display messages. If the flag is set
to `off', these messages are overlaid in reverse video mode at
the display line. The default setting is `on'.
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The second form tells screen what to do if the terminal doesn't
have a hardstatus line (i.e. the termcap/terminfo capabilities
"hs", "ts", "fs" and "ds" are not set). When
"firstline/lastline" is used, screen will reserve the first/last
line of the display for the hardstatus. "message" uses screen's
message mechanism and "ignore" tells screen never to display the
hardstatus. If you prepend the word "always" to the type (e.g.,
"alwayslastline"), screen will use the type even if the terminal
supports a hardstatus.
The third form specifies the contents of the hardstatus line.
'%h' is used as default string, i.e., the stored hardstatus of
the current window (settable via "ESC]0;<string>^G" or
"ESC_<string>ESC\") is displayed. You can customize this to any
string you like including the escapes from the "STRING ESCAPES"
chapter. If you leave out the argument string, the current string
is displayed.
You can mix the second and third form by providing the string as
additional argument.
height [-w|-d] [
Set the display height to a specified number of lines. When no
argument is given it toggles between 24 and 42 lines display. You
can also specify a width if you want to change both values. The
-w option tells screen to leave the display size unchanged and
just set the window size, -d vice versa.
help[class]
Not really a online help, but displays a help screen showing you
all the key bindings. The first pages list all the internal
commands followed by their current bindings. Subsequent pages
will display the custom commands, one command per key. Press
space when you're done reading each page, or return to exit
early. All other characters are ignored. If the "-c" option is
given, display all bound commands for the specified command
class. See also "DEFAULT KEY BINDINGS" section.
history
Usually users work with a shell that allows easy access to
previous commands. For example csh has the command "!!" to
repeat the last command executed. Screen allows you to have a
primitive way of re-calling "the command that started ": You
just type the first letter of that command, then hit `C-a {' and
screen tries to find a previous line that matches with the
`prompt character' to the left of the cursor. This line is pasted
into this window's input queue. Thus you have a crude command
history (made up by the visible window and its scrollback
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buffer).
hstatus status
Change the window's hardstatus line to the string status.
idle [timeout[cmd-args]]
Sets a command that is run after the specified number of seconds
inactivity is reached. This command will normally be the
"blanker" command to create a screen blanker, but it can be any
screen command. If no command is specified, only the timeout is
set. A timeout of zero (or the special timeout off) disables the
timer. If no arguments are given, the current settings are
displayed.
ignorecase [on|off]
Tell screen to ignore the case of characters in searches. Default
is `off'. Without any options, the state of ignorecase is
toggled.
info
Uses the message line to display some information about the
current window: the cursor position in the form "(column,row)"
starting with "(1,1)", the terminal width and height plus the
size of the scrollback buffer in lines, like in "(80,24)+50", the
current state of window XON/XOFF flow control is shown like this
(See also section FLOW CONTROL):
+flow automatic flow control, currently on.
-flow automatic flow control, currently off.
+(+)flow flow control enabled. Agrees with automatic control.
-(+)flow flow control disabled. Disagrees with automatic control.
+(-)flow flow control enabled. Disagrees with automatic control.
-(-)flow flow control disabled. Agrees with automatic control.
The current line wrap setting (`+wrap' indicates enabled, `-wrap'
not) is also shown. The flags `ins', `org', `app', `log', `mon'
or `nored' are displayed when the window is in insert mode,
origin mode, application-keypad mode, has output logging,
activity monitoring or partial redraw enabled.
The currently active character set (G0, G1, G2, or G3) and in
square brackets the terminal character sets that are currently
designated as G0 through G3 is shown. If the window is in UTF-8
mode, the string "UTF-8" is shown instead.
Additional modes depending on the type of the window are
displayed at the end of the status line (See also chapter "WINDOW
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TYPES").
If the state machine of the terminal emulator is in a non-default
state, the info line is started with a string identifying the
current state.
For system information use the "time" command.
ins_reg [key]
No longer exists, use "paste" instead.
kill
Kill current window.
If there is an `exec' command running then it is killed.
Otherwise the process (shell) running in the window receives a
HANGUP condition, the window structure is removed and screen
(your display) switches to another window. When the last window
is destroyed, screen exits. After a kill screen switches to the
previously displayed window.
Note: Emacs users should keep this command in mind, when killing
a line. It is recommended not to use "C-a" as the screen escape
key or to rebind kill to "C-a K".
lastmsg
Redisplay the last contents of the message/status line. Useful
if you're typing when a message appears, because the message
goes away when you press a key (unless your terminal has a
hardware status line). Refer to the commands "msgwait" and
"msgminwait" for fine tuning.
layout new [title]
Create a new layout. The screen will change to one whole region
and be switched to the blank window. From here, you build the
regions and the windows they show as you desire. The new layout
will be numbered with the smallest available integer, starting
with zero. You can optionally give a title to your new layout.
Otherwise, it will have a default title of "layout". You can
always change the title later by using the command layout title.
layout remove [n|title]
Remove, or in other words, delete the specified layout. Either
the number or the title can be specified. Without either
specification, screen will remove the current layout.
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Removing a layout does not affect your set windows or regions.
layout next
Switch to the next layout available
layout prev
Switch to the previous layout available
layout select [n|title]
Select the desired layout. Either the number or the title can be
specified. Without either specification, screen will prompt and
ask which screen is desired. To see which layouts are available,
use the layout show command.
layout show
List on the message line the number(s) and title(s) of the
available layout(s). The current layout is flagged.
layout title [title]
Change or display the title of the current layout. A string given
will be used to name the layout. Without any options, the current
title and number is displayed on the message line.
layout number [n]
Change or display the number of the current layout. An integer
given will be used to number the layout. Without any options, the
current number and title is displayed on the message line.
layout attach [title|:last]
Change or display which layout to reattach back to. The default
is :last, which tells screen to reattach back to the last used
layout just before detachment. By supplying a title, You can
instruct screen to reattach to a particular layout regardless
which one was used at the time of detachment. Without any
options, the layout to reattach to will be shown in the message
line.
layout save [n|title]
Remember the current arrangement of regions. When used, screen
will remember the arrangement of vertically and horizontally
split regions. This arrangement is restored when a screen session
is reattached or switched back from a different layout. If the
session ends or the screen process dies, the layout arrangements
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are lost. The layout dump command should help in this siutation.
If a number or title is supplied, screen will remember the
arrangement of that particular layout. Without any options,
screen will remember the current layout.
Saving your regions can be done automatically by using the layout
autosave command.
layout autosave [on|off]
Change or display the status of automatcally saving layouts. The
default is on, meaning when screen is detached or changed to a
different layout, the arrangement of regions and windows will be
remembered at the time of change and restored upon return. If
autosave is set to off, that arrangement will only be restored to
either to the last manual save, using layout save, or to when the
layout was first created, to a single region with a single
window. Without either an on or off, the current status is
displayed on the message line.
layout dump [filename]
Write to a file the order of splits made in the current layout.
This is useful to recreate the order of your regions used in your
current layout. Only the current layout is recorded. While the
order of the regions are recorded, the sizes of those regions and
which windows correspond to which regions are not. If no filename
is specified, the default is layout-dump, saved in the directory
that the screen process was started in. If the file already
exists, layout dump will append to that file. As an example:
C-a : layout dump /home/user/.screenrc
will save or append the layout to the user's .screenrc file.
license
Display the disclaimer page. This is done whenever screen is
started without options, which should be often enough. See also
the "startup_message" command.
lockscreen
Lock this display. Call a screenlock program (/local/bin/lck or
/usr/bin/lock or a builtin if no other is available). Screen does
not accept any command keys until this program terminates.
Meanwhile processes in the windows may continue, as the windows
are in the `detached' state. The screenlock program may be
changed through the environment variable $LOCKPRG (which must be
set in the shell from which screen is started) and is executed
with the user's uid and gid.
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Warning: When you leave other shells unlocked and you have no
password set on screen, the lock is void: One could easily re-
attach from an unlocked shell. This feature should rather be
called `lockterminal'.
log [on|off]
Start/stop writing output of the current window to a file
"screenlog.n" in the window's default directory, where n is the
number of the current window. This filename can be changed with
the `logfile' command. If no parameter is given, the state of
logging is toggled. The session log is appended to the previous
contents of the file if it already exists. The current contents
and the contents of the scrollback history are not included in
the session log. Default is `off'.
logfile filename
logfile flush secs
Defines the name the log files will get. The default is
"screenlog.%n". The second form changes the number of seconds
screen will wait before flushing the logfile buffer to the file-
system. The default value is 10 seconds.
login [on|off]
Adds or removes the entry in the utmp database file for the
current window. This controls if the window is `logged in'.
When no parameter is given, the login state of the window is
toggled. Additionally to that toggle, it is convenient having a
`log in' and a `log out' key. E.g. `bind I login on' and `bind O
login off' will map these keys to be C-a I and C-a O. The
default setting (in config.h.in) should be "on" for a screen that
runs under suid-root. Use the "deflogin" command to change the
default login state for new windows. Both commands are only
present when screen has been compiled with utmp support.
logtstamp [on|off]
logtstamp after [secs]
logtstamp string
[string]
This command controls logfile time-stamp mechanism of screen. If
time-stamps are turned "on", screen adds a string containing the
current time to the logfile after two minutes of inactivity.
When output continues and more than another two minutes have
passed, a second time-stamp is added to document the restart of
the output. You can change this timeout with the second form of
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the command. The third form is used for customizing the time-
stamp string (`-- %n:%t -- time-stamp -- %M/%d/%y %c:%s --\n' by
default).
mapdefault
Tell screen that the next input character should only be looked
up in the default bindkey table. See also "bindkey".
mapnotnext
Like mapdefault, but don't even look in the default bindkey
table.
maptimeout [timeout]
Set the inter-character timer for input sequence detection to a
timeout of timeout ms. The default timeout is 300ms. Maptimeout
with no arguments shows the current setting. See also "bindkey".
markkeys string
This is a method of changing the keymap used for copy/history
mode. The string is made up of oldchar=newchar pairs which are
separated by `:'. Example: The string "B=^B:F=^F" will change the
keys `C-b' and `C-f' to the vi style binding (scroll up/down fill
page). This happens to be the default binding for `B' and `F'.
The command "markkeys h=^B:l=^F:$=^E" would set the mode for an
emacs-style binding. If your terminal sends characters, that
cause you to abort copy mode, then this command may help by
binding these characters to do nothing. The no-op character is
`@' and is used like this: "markkeys @=L=H" if you do not want to
use the `H' or `L' commands any longer. As shown in this
example, multiple keys can be assigned to one function in a
single statement.
maxwin num
Set the maximum window number screen will create. Doesn't affect
already existing windows. The number can be increased only when
there are no existing windows.
meta
Insert the command character (C-a) in the current window's input
stream.
monitor [on|off]
Toggles activity monitoring of windows. When monitoring is
turned on and an affected window is switched into the background,
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you will receive the activity notification message in the status
line at the first sign of output and the window will also be
marked with an `@' in the window-status display. Monitoring is
initially off for all windows.
mousetrack [on|off]
This command determines whether screen will watch for mouse
clicks. When this command is enabled, regions that have been
split in various ways can be selected by pointing to them with a
mouse and left-clicking them. Without specifying on or off, the
current state is displayed. The default state is determined by
the "defmousetrack" command.
msgminwait sec
Defines the time screen delays a new message when one message is
currently displayed. The default is 1 second.
msgwait sec
Defines the time a message is displayed if screen is not
disturbed by other activity. The default is 5 seconds.
multiuser on|off
Switch between singleuser and multiuser mode. Standard screen
operation is singleuser. In multiuser mode the commands `acladd',
`aclchg', `aclgrp' and `acldel' can be used to enable (and
disable) other users accessing this screen session.
nethack on|off
Changes the kind of error messages used by screen. When you are
familiar with the game "nethack", you may enjoy the nethack-style
messages which will often blur the facts a little, but are much
funnier to read. Anyway, standard messages often tend to be
unclear as well.
This option is only available if screen was compiled with the
NETHACK flag defined. The default setting is then determined by
the presence of the environment variable $NETHACKOPTIONS and the
file ~/.nethackrc - if either one is present, the default is on.
next
Switch to the next window. This command can be used repeatedly
to cycle through the list of windows.
nonblock
[on|off|numsecs
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Tell screen how to deal with user interfaces (displays) that
cease to accept output. This can happen if a user presses ^S or a
TCP/modem connection gets cut but no hangup is received. If
nonblock is off (this is the default) screen waits until the
display restarts to accept the output. If nonblock is on, screen
waits until the timeout is reached (on is treated as 1s). If the
display still doesn't receive characters, screen will consider it
"blocked" and stop sending characters to it. If at some time it
restarts to accept characters, screen will unblock the display
and redisplay the updated window contents.
number [[+|-]n]
Change the current window's number. If the given number n is
already used by another window, both windows exchange their
numbers. If no argument is specified, the current window number
(and title) is shown. Using `+' or `-' will change the window's
number by the relative amount specified.
obuflimit [limit]
If the output buffer contains more bytes than the specified
limit, no more data will be read from the windows. The default
value is 256. If you have a fast display (like xterm), you can
set it to some higher value. If no argument is specified, the
current setting is displayed.
only
Kill all regions but the current one.
other
Switch to the window displayed previously. If this window does no
longer exist, other has the same effect as next.
partial on|off
Defines whether the display should be refreshed (as with
redisplay) after switching to the current window. This command
only affects the current window. To immediately affect all
windows use the allpartial command. Default is `off', of course.
This default is fixed, as there is currently no defpartial
command.
password [crypted_pw]
Present a crypted password in your ".screenrc" file and screen
will ask for it, whenever someone attempts to resume a detached.
This is useful if you have privileged programs running under
screen and you want to protect your session from reattach
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attempts by another user masquerading as your uid (i.e. any
superuser.) If no crypted password is specified, screen prompts
twice for typing a password and places its encryption in the
paste buffer. Default is `none', this disables password
checking.
paste [registers [dest_reg]]
Write the (concatenated) contents of the specified registers to
the stdin queue of the current window. The register '.' is
treated as the paste buffer. If no parameter is given the user is
prompted for a single register to paste. The paste buffer can be
filled with the copy, history and readbuf commands. Other
registers can be filled with the register, readreg and paste
commands. If paste is called with a second argument, the
contents of the specified registers is pasted into the named
destination register rather than the window. If '.' is used as
the second argument, the displays paste buffer is the
destination. Note, that "paste" uses a wide variety of
resources: Whenever a second argument is specified no current
window is needed. When the source specification only contains
registers (not the paste buffer) then there need not be a current
display (terminal attached), as the registers are a global
resource. The paste buffer exists once for every user.
pastefont [on|off]
Tell screen to include font information in the paste buffer. The
default is not to do so. This command is especially useful for
multi character fonts like kanji.
pow_break
Reopen the window's terminal line and send a break condition. See
`break'.
pow_detach
Power detach. Mainly the same as detach, but also sends a HANGUP
signal to the parent process of screen. CAUTION: This will
result in a logout, when screen was started from your login-
shell.
pow_detach_msg [message]
The message specified here is output whenever a `Power detach'
was performed. It may be used as a replacement for a logout
message or to reset baud rate, etc. Without parameter, the
current message is shown.
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prev
Switch to the window with the next lower number. This command
can be used repeatedly to cycle through the list of windows.
printcmd [cmd]
If cmd is not an empty string, screen will not use the terminal
capabilities "po/pf" if it detects an ansi print sequence ESC [ 5
i, but pipe the output into cmd. This should normally be a
command like "lpr" or "'cat > /tmp/scrprint'". printcmd without
a command displays the current setting. The ansi sequence ESC \
ends printing and closes the pipe.
Warning: Be careful with this command! If other user have write
access to your terminal, they will be able to fire off print
commands.
process [key]
Stuff the contents of the specified register into screen's input
queue. If no argument is given you are prompted for a register
name. The text is parsed as if it had been typed in from the
user's keyboard. This command can be used to bind multiple
actions to a single key.
quit
Kill all windows and terminate screen. Note that on VT100-style
terminals the keys C-4 and C-\ are identical. This makes the
default bindings dangerous: Be careful not to type C-a C-4 when
selecting window no. 4. Use the empty bind command (as in "bind
'^\'") to remove a key binding.
readbuf [encoding] [filename]
Reads the contents of the specified file into the paste buffer.
You can tell screen the encoding of the file via the -e option.
If no file is specified, the screen-exchange filename is used.
See also "bufferfile" command.
readreg [encoding] [register [
Does one of two things, dependent on number of arguments: with
zero or one arguments it it duplicates the paste buffer contents
into the register specified or entered at the prompt. With two
arguments it reads the contents of the named file into the
register, just as readbuf reads the screen-exchange file into the
paste buffer. You can tell screen the encoding of the file via
the -e option. The following example will paste the system's
password file into the screen window (using register p, where a
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copy remains):
C-a : readreg p /etc/passwd
C-a : paste p
redisplay
Redisplay the current window. Needed to get a full redisplay when
in partial redraw mode.
register [-eencoding]key-string
Save the specified string to the register key. The encoding of
the string can be specified via the -e option. See also the
"paste" command.
remove
Kill the current region. This is a no-op if there is only one
region.
removebuf
Unlinks the screen-exchange file used by the commands "writebuf"
and "readbuf".
rendition bell | monitor | silence |
Change the way screen renders the titles of windows that have
monitor or bell flags set in caption or hardstatus or windowlist.
See the "STRING ESCAPES" chapter for the syntax of the modifiers.
The default for monitor is currently "=b " (bold, active colors),
for bell "=ub " (underline, bold and active colors), and "=u "
for silence.
reset
Reset the virtual terminal to its "power-on" values. Useful when
strange settings (like scroll regions or graphics character set)
are left over from an application.
resize
Resize the current region. The space will be removed from or
added to the region below or if there's not enough space from the
region above.
resize +N
increase current region height by N
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resize -N
decrease current region height by N
resize N
set current region height to N
resize =
make all windows equally high
resize max
maximize current region height
resize min
minimize current region height
screen [-opts] [n] [cmd [args]|//group]
Establish a new window. The flow-control options (-f, -fn and
-fa), title (a.k.a.) option (-t), login options (-l and -ln) ,
terminal type option (-T <term>), the all-capability-flag (-a)
and scrollback option (-h <num>) may be specified with each
command. The option (-M) turns monitoring on for this window.
The option (-L) turns output logging on for this window. If an
optional number n in the range 0..MAXWIN-1 is given, the window
number n is assigned to the newly created window (or, if this
number is already in-use, the next available number). If a
command is specified after "screen", this command (with the given
arguments) is started in the window; otherwise, a shell is
created. If //group is supplied, a container-type window is
created in which other windows may be created inside it.
Thus, if your ".screenrc" contains the lines
# example for .screenrc:
screen 1
screen -fn -t foobar -L 2 telnet foobar
screen creates a shell window (in window #1) and a window with a
TELNET connection to the machine foobar (with no flow-control
using the title "foobar" in window #2) and will write a logfile
("screenlog.2") of the telnet session. Note, that unlike
previous versions of screen no additional default window is
created when "screen" commands are included in your ".screenrc"
file. When the initialization is completed, screen switches to
the last window specified in your .screenrc file or, if none,
opens a default window #0.
Screen has built in some functionality of "cu" and "telnet". See
also chapter "WINDOW TYPES".
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scrollback num
Set the size of the scrollback buffer for the current windows to
num lines. The default scrollback is 100 lines. See also the
"defscrollback" command and use "info" to view the current
setting. To access and use the contents in the scrollback buffer,
use the "copy" command.
select [WindowID]
Switch to the window identified by WindowID. This can be a
prefix of a window title (alphanumeric window name) or a window
number. The parameter is optional and if omitted, you get
prompted for an identifier. When a new window is established, the
first available number is assigned to this window. Thus, the
first window can be activated by "select 0". The number of
windows is limited at compile-time by the MAXWIN configuration
parameter (which defaults to 40). There are two special
WindowIDs, "-" selects the internal blank window and "." selects
the current window. The latter is useful if used with screen's
"-X" option.
sessionname [name]
Rename the current session. Note, that for "screen -list" the
name shows up with the process-id prepended. If the argument
"name" is omitted, the name of this session is displayed.
Caution: The $STY environment variables will still reflect the
old name in pre-existing shells. This may result in confusion.
Use of this command is generally discouraged. Use the "-S"
command-line option if you want to name a new session. The
default is constructed from the tty and host names.
setenv [var [string]]
Set the environment variable var to value string. If only var is
specified, the user will be prompted to enter a value. If no
parameters are specified, the user will be prompted for both
variable and value. The environment is inherited by all
subsequently forked shells.
setsid [on|off]
Normally screen uses different sessions and process groups for
the windows. If setsid is turned off, this is not done anymore
and all windows will be in the same process group as the screen
backend process. This also breaks job-control, so be careful.
The default is on, of course. This command is probably useful
only in rare circumstances.
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shell command
Set the command to be used to create a new shell. This overrides
the value of the environment variable $SHELL. This is useful if
you'd like to run a tty-enhancer which is expecting to execute
the program specified in $SHELL. If the command begins with a '-'
character, the shell will be started as a login-shell. Typical
shells do only minimal initialization when not started as a
login-shell. E.g. Bash will not read your "~/.bashrc" unless it
is a login-shell.
shelltitle title
Set the title for all shells created during startup or by the C-A
C-c command. For details about what a title is, see the
discussion entitled "TITLES (naming windows)".
silence [on|off|sec]
Toggles silence monitoring of windows. When silence is turned on
and an affected window is switched into the background, you will
receive the silence notification message in the status line after
a specified period of inactivity (silence). The default timeout
can be changed with the `silencewait' command or by specifying a
number of seconds instead of `on' or `off'. Silence is initially
off for all windows.
silencewait sec
Define the time that all windows monitored for silence should
wait before displaying a message. Default 30 seconds.
sleep num
This command will pause the execution of a .screenrc file for num
seconds. Keyboard activity will end the sleep. It may be used
to give users a chance to read the messages output by "echo".
slowpaste msec
Define the speed at which text is inserted into the current
window by the paste ("C-a ]") command. If the slowpaste value is
nonzero text is written character by character. screen will make
a pause of msec milliseconds after each single character write to
allow the application to process its input. Only use slowpaste if
your underlying system exposes flow control problems while
pasting large amounts of text.
sort
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Sort the windows in alphabetical order of the window tiles.
source file
Read and execute commands from file file. Source commands may be
nested to a maximum recursion level of ten. If file is not an
absolute path and screen is already processing a source command,
the parent directory of the running source command file is used
to search for the new command file before screen's current
directory.
Note that termcap/terminfo/termcapinfo commands only work at
startup and reattach time, so they must be reached via the
default screenrc files to have an effect.
sorendition [attr[color]]
This command is deprecated. See "rendition so" instead.
split[-v]
Split the current region into two new ones. All regions on the
display are resized to make room for the new region. The blank
window is displayed on the new region. Splits are made
horizontally unless -v is used. Use the "remove" or the "only"
command to delete regions. Use "focus" to toggle between regions.
startup_message on|off
Select whether you want to see the copyright notice during
startup. Default is `on', as you probably noticed.
status [top|up|
[left|right]
The status window by default is in bottom-left corner. This
command can move status messages to any corner of the screen. top
is the same as up, down is the same as bottom.
stuff [string]
Stuff the string string in the input buffer of the current
window. This is like the "paste" command but with much less
overhead. Without a parameter, screen will prompt for a string
to stuff. You cannot paste large buffers with the "stuff"
command. It is most useful for key bindings. See also "bindkey".
su [username [password [
Substitute the user of a display. The command prompts for all
parameters that are omitted. If passwords are specified as
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parameters, they have to be specified un-crypted. The first
password is matched against the systems passwd database, the
second password is matched against the screen password as set
with the commands "acladd" or "password". "Su" may be useful for
the screen administrator to test multiuser setups. When the
identification fails, the user has access to the commands
available for user nobody. These are "detach", "license",
"version", "help" and "displays".
suspend
Suspend screen. The windows are in the `detached' state, while
screen is suspended. This feature relies on the shell being able
to do job control.
term term
In each window's environment screen opens, the $TERM variable is
set to "screen" by default. But when no description for "screen"
is installed in the local termcap or terminfo data base, you set
$TERM to - say - "vt100". This won't do much harm, as screen is
VT100/ANSI compatible. The use of the "term" command is
discouraged for non-default purpose. That is, one may want to
specify special $TERM settings (e.g. vt100) for the next "screen
rlogin othermachine" command. Use the command "screen -T vt100
rlogin othermachine" rather than setting and resetting the
default.
termcap term terminal-tweaks[window-tweaks]
terminfo term terminal-tweaks[window-tweaks]
termcapinfo term terminal-tweaks[window-tweaks]
Use this command to modify your terminal's termcap entry without
going through all the hassles involved in creating a custom
termcap entry. Plus, you can optionally customize the termcap
generated for the windows. You have to place these commands in
one of the screenrc startup files, as they are meaningless once
the terminal emulator is booted.
If your system works uses the terminfo database rather than
termcap, screen will understand the `terminfo' command, which has
the same effects as the `termcap' command. Two separate commands
are provided, as there are subtle syntactic differences, e.g.
when parameter interpolation (using `%') is required. Note that
termcap names of the capabilities have to be used with the
`terminfo' command.
In many cases, where the arguments are valid in both terminfo and
termcap syntax, you can use the command `termcapinfo', which is
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just a shorthand for a pair of `termcap' and `terminfo' commands
with identical arguments.
The first argument specifies which terminal(s) should be affected
by this definition. You can specify multiple terminal names by
separating them with `|'s. Use `*' to match all terminals and
`vt*' to match all terminals that begin with "vt".
Each tweak argument contains one or more termcap defines
(separated by `:'s) to be inserted at the start of the
appropriate termcap entry, enhancing it or overriding existing
values. The first tweak modifies your terminal's termcap, and
contains definitions that your terminal uses to perform certain
functions. Specify a null string to leave this unchanged (e.g.
''). The second (optional) tweak modifies all the window
termcaps, and should contain definitions that screen understands
(see the "VIRTUAL TERMINAL" section).
Some examples:
termcap xterm* LP:hs@
Informs screen that all terminals that begin with `xterm' have
firm auto-margins that allow the last position on the screen to
be updated (LP), but they don't really have a status line (no
'hs' - append `@' to turn entries off). Note that we assume `LP'
for all terminal names that start with "vt", but only if you
don't specify a termcap command for that terminal.
termcap vt* LP
termcap vt102|vt220 Z0=\E[?3h:Z1=\E[?3l
Specifies the firm-margined `LP' capability for all terminals
that begin with `vt', and the second line will also add the
escape-sequences to switch into (Z0) and back out of (Z1) 132-
character-per-line mode if this is a VT102 or VT220. (You must
specify Z0 and Z1 in your termcap to use the width-changing
commands.)
termcap vt100 "" l0=PF1:l1=PF2:l2=PF3:l3=PF4
This leaves your vt100 termcap alone and adds the function key
labels to each window's termcap entry.
termcap h19|z19 am@:im=\E@:ei=\EO dc=\E[P
Takes a h19 or z19 termcap and turns off auto-margins (am@) and
enables the insert mode (im) and end-insert (ei) capabilities
(the `@' in the `im' string is after the `=', so it is part of
the string). Having the `im' and `ei' definitions put into your
terminal's termcap will cause screen to automatically advertise
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the character-insert capability in each window's termcap. Each
window will also get the delete-character capability (dc) added
to its termcap, which screen will translate into a line-update
for the terminal (we're pretending it doesn't support character
deletion).
If you would like to fully specify each window's termcap entry,
you should instead set the $SCREENCAP variable prior to running
screen. See the discussion on the "VIRTUAL TERMINAL" in this
manual, and the termcap(5) man page for more information on
termcap definitions.
time [string]
Uses the message line to display the time of day, the host name,
and the load averages over 1, 5, and 15 minutes (if this is
available on your system). For window specific information, use
"info".
If a string is specified, it changes the format of the time
report like it is described in the "STRING ESCAPES" chapter.
Screen uses a default of "%c:%s %M %d %H%? %l%?".
title [windowtitle]
Set the name of the current window to windowtitle. If no name is
specified, screen prompts for one. This command was known as
`aka' in previous releases.
truecolor [on|off]
Enables truecolor support. Currently autodetection of truecolor
support cannot be done reliably, as such it's left to user to
enable. Default is off. Known terminals that may support it are:
iTerm2, Konsole, st. Xterm includes support for truecolor
escapes but converts them back to indexed 256 color space.
unbindall
Unbind all the bindings. This can be useful when screen is used
solely for its detaching abilities, such as when letting a
console application run as a daemon. If, for some reason, it is
necessary to bind commands after this, use 'screen -X'.
unsetenv var
Unset an environment variable.
utf8 [on|off[
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Change the encoding used in the current window. If utf8 is
enabled, the strings sent to the window will be UTF-8 encoded and
vice versa. Omitting the parameter toggles the setting. If a
second parameter is given, the display's encoding is also changed
(this should rather be done with screen's "-U" option). See also
"defutf8", which changes the default setting of a new window.
vbell [on|off]
Sets the visual bell setting for this window. Omitting the
parameter toggles the setting. If vbell is switched on, but your
terminal does not support a visual bell, a `vbell-message' is
displayed in the status line when the bell character (^G) is
received. Visual bell support of a terminal is defined by the
termcap variable `vb' (terminfo: 'flash').
Per default, vbell is off, thus the audible bell is used. See
also `bell_msg'.
vbell_msg [message]
Sets the visual bell message. message is printed to the status
line if the window receives a bell character (^G), vbell is set
to "on", but the terminal does not support a visual bell. The
default message is "Wuff, Wuff!!". Without a parameter, the
current message is shown.
vbellwait sec
Define a delay in seconds after each display of screen's visual
bell message. The default is 1 second.
verbose [on|off]
If verbose is switched on, the command name is echoed, whenever a
window is created (or resurrected from zombie state). Default is
off. Without a parameter, the current setting is shown.
version
Print the current version and the compile date in the status
line.
wall message
Write a message to all displays. The message will appear in the
terminal's status line.
width [-w|-d] [
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Toggle the window width between 80 and 132 columns or set it to
cols columns if an argument is specified. This requires a capable
terminal and the termcap entries "Z0" and "Z1". See the
"termcap" command for more information. You can also specify a
new height if you want to change both values. The -w option
tells screen to leave the display size unchanged and just set the
window size, -d vice versa.
windowlist [-b] [-m] [
windowlist string [string]
windowlist title [title]
Display all windows in a table for visual window selection. If
screen was in a window group, screen will back out of the group
and then display the windows in that group. If the -b option is
given, screen will switch to the blank window before presenting
the list, so that the current window is also selectable. The -m
option changes the order of the windows, instead of sorting by
window numbers screen uses its internal most-recently-used list.
The -g option will show the windows inside any groups in that
level and downwards.
The following keys are used to navigate in "windowlist":
allbox tab(@); l l. k, C-p, or up@Move up one line. j, C-n, or
down@Move down one line. C-g or escape@Exit windowlist. C-a or
home@Move to the first line. C-e or end@Move to the last line.
C-u or C-d@Move one half page up or down. C-b or C-f@Move one
full page up or down. 0..9@Using the number keys, move to the
selected line. mouseclick@T{ Move to the selected line.
Available when "mousetrack" is set to "on" T} /@Search. n@Repeat
search in the forward direction. N@Repeat search in the backward
direction. m@Toggle MRU. g@Toggle group nesting. a@All window
view. C-h or backspace@Back out the group. ,@Switch numbers
with the previous window. K@Kill that window. space or
enter@Select that window.
The table format can be changed with the string and title option,
the title is displayed as table heading, while the lines are made
by using the string setting. The default setting is "Num
Name%=Flags" for the title and "%3n %t%=%f" for the lines. See
the "STRING ESCAPES" chapter for more codes (e.g. color
settings).
"Windowlist" needs a region size of at least 10 characters wide
and 6 characters high in order to display.
windows [ string ]
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Uses the message line to display a list of all the windows. Each
window is listed by number with the name of process that has been
started in the window (or its title); the current window is
marked with a `*'; the previous window is marked with a `-'; all
the windows that are "logged in" are marked with a `$'; a
background window that has received a bell is marked with a `!';
a background window that is being monitored and has had activity
occur is marked with an `@'; a window which has output logging
turned on is marked with `(L)'; windows occupied by other users
are marked with `&'; windows in the zombie state are marked with
`Z'. If this list is too long to fit on the terminal's status
line only the portion around the current window is displayed.
The optional string parameter follows the "STRING ESCAPES"
format. If string parameter is passed, the output size is
unlimited. The default command without any parameter is limited
to a size of 1024 bytes.
wrap [on|off]
Sets the line-wrap setting for the current window. When line-
wrap is on, the second consecutive printable character output at
the last column of a line will wrap to the start of the following
line. As an added feature, backspace (^H) will also wrap through
the left margin to the previous line. Default is `on'. Without
any options, the state of wrap is toggled.
writebuf [-e encoding
Writes the contents of the paste buffer to the specified file, or
the public accessible screen-exchange file if no filename is
given. This is thought of as a primitive means of communication
between screen users on the same host. If an encoding is
specified the paste buffer is recoded on the fly to match the
encoding. The filename can be set with the bufferfile command
and defaults to "/tmp/screen-exchange".
writelock [on|off|auto]
In addition to access control lists, not all users may be able to
write to the same window at once. Per default, writelock is in
`auto' mode and grants exclusive input permission to the user who
is the first to switch to the particular window. When he leaves
the window, other users may obtain the writelock (automatically).
The writelock of the current window is disabled by the command
"writelock off". If the user issues the command "writelock on" he
keeps the exclusive write permission while switching to other
windows.
xoff
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xon
Insert a CTRL-s / CTRL-q character to the stdin queue of the
current window.
zmodem [off|auto|catch|pass]
zmodem sendcmd [string]
zmodem recvcmd [string]
Define zmodem support for screen. Screen understands two
different modes when it detects a zmodem request: "pass" and
"catch". If the mode is set to "pass", screen will relay all
data to the attacher until the end of the transmission is
reached. In "catch" mode screen acts as a zmodem endpoint and
starts the corresponding rz/sz commands. If the mode is set to
"auto", screen will use "catch" if the window is a tty (e.g. a
serial line), otherwise it will use "pass".
You can define the templates screen uses in "catch" mode via the
second and the third form.
Note also that this is an experimental feature.
zombie [keys[onerror]]
defzombie [keys]
Per default screen windows are removed from the window list as
soon as the windows process (e.g. shell) exits. When a string of
two keys is specified to the zombie command, `dead' windows will
remain in the list. The kill command may be used to remove such
a window. Pressing the first key in the dead window has the same
effect. When pressing the second key, screen will attempt to
resurrect the window. The process that was initially running in
the window will be launched again. Calling zombie without
parameters will clear the zombie setting, thus making windows
disappear when their process exits.
As the zombie-setting is manipulated globally for all windows,
this command should only be called defzombie. Until we need this
as a per window setting, the commands zombie and defzombie are
synonymous.
Optionally you can put the word "onerror" after the keys. This
will cause screen to monitor exit status of the process running
in the window. If it exits normally ('0'), the window disappears.
Any other exit value causes the window to become a zombie.
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zombie_timeout[seconds]
Per default screen windows are removed from the window list as
soon as the windows process (e.g. shell) exits. If zombie keys
are defined (compare with above zombie command), it is possible
to also set a timeout when screen tries to automatically
reconnect a dead screen window.
THE MESSAGE LINE
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.
WINDOW TYPES
Screen provides three different window types. New windows are created
with screen's screen command (see also the entry in chapter
"CUSTOMIZATION"). The first parameter to the screen command defines
which type of window is created. The different window types are all
special cases of the normal type. They have been added in order to
allow screen to be used efficiently as a console multiplexer with 100
or more windows.
+ The normal window contains a shell (default, if no parameter is
given) or any other system command that could be executed from a
shell (e.g. slogin, etc)
+ If a tty (character special device) name (e.g. "/dev/ttya") is
specified as the first parameter, then the window is directly
connected to this device. This window type is similar to "screen cu
-l /dev/ttya". Read and write access is required on the device
node, an exclusive open is attempted on the node to mark the
connection line as busy. An optional parameter is allowed
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consisting of a comma separated list of flags in the notation used
by stty(1):
<baud_rate>
Usually 300, 1200, 9600 or 19200. This affects transmission as
well as receive speed.
cs8 or cs7
Specify the transmission of eight (or seven) bits per byte.
ixon or -ixon
Enables (or disables) software flow-control (CTRL-S/CTRL-Q)
for sending data.
ixoff or -ixoff
Enables (or disables) software flow-control for receiving
data.
istrip or -istrip
Clear (or keep) the eight bit in each received byte.
You may want to specify as many of these options as applicable.
Unspecified options cause the terminal driver to make up the
parameter values of the connection. These values are system
dependent and may be in defaults or values saved from a previous
connection.
For tty windows, the info command shows some of the modem control
lines in the status line. These may include `RTS', `CTS', 'DTR',
`DSR', `CD' and more. This depends on the available ioctl()'s and
system header files as well as the on the physical capabilities of
the serial board. Signals that are logical low (inactive) have
their name preceded by an exclamation mark (!), otherwise the
signal is logical high (active). Signals not supported by the
hardware but available to the ioctl() interface are usually shown
low.
When the CLOCAL status bit is true, the whole set of modem signals
is placed inside curly braces ({ and }). When the CRTSCTS or
TIOCSOFTCAR bit is set, the signals `CTS' or `CD' are shown in
parenthesis, respectively.
For tty windows, the command break causes the Data transmission
line (TxD) to go low for a specified period of time. This is
expected to be interpreted as break signal on the other side. No
data is sent and no modem control line is changed when a break is
issued.
+ If the first parameter is "//telnet", the second parameter is
expected to be a host name, and an optional third parameter may
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specify a TCP port number (default decimal 23). Screen will
connect to a server listening on the remote host and use the telnet
protocol to communicate with that server.
For telnet windows, the command info shows details about the
connection in square brackets ([ and ]) at the end of the status line.
b BINARY. The connection is in binary mode.
e ECHO. Local echo is disabled.
c SGA. The connection is in `character mode' (default: `line
mode').
t TTYPE. The terminal type has been requested by the remote
host. Screen sends the name "screen" unless instructed
otherwise (see also the command `term').
w NAWS. The remote site is notified about window size changes.
f LFLOW. The remote host will send flow control information.
(Ignored at the moment.)
Additional flags for debugging are x, t and n (XDISPLOC, TSPEED
and NEWENV).
For telnet windows, the command break sends the telnet code IAC
BREAK (decimal 243) to the remote host.
This window type is only available if screen was compiled with
the ENABLE_TELNET option defined.
STRING ESCAPES
Screen provides an escape mechanism to insert information like the
current time into messages or file names. The escape character is '%'
with one exception: inside of a window's hardstatus '^%' ('^E') is
used instead.
Here is the full list of supported escapes:
% the escape character itself
E sets %? to true if the escape character has been pressed.
f flags of the window, see "windows" for meanings of the various
flags
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F sets %? to true if the window has the focus
h hardstatus of the window
H hostname of the system
n window number
P sets %? to true if the current region is in copy/paste mode
S session name
s window size
t window title
u all other users on this window
w all window numbers and names. With '-' qualifier: up to the
current window; with '+' qualifier: starting with the window
after the current one.
W all window numbers and names except the current one
x the executed command including arguments running in this windows
X the executed command without arguments running in this windows
? the part to the next '%?' is displayed only if a '%' escape
inside the part expands to a non-empty string
: else part of '%?'
= pad the string to the display's width (like TeX's hfill). If a
number is specified, pad to the percentage of the window's width.
A '0' qualifier tells screen to treat the number as absolute
position. You can specify to pad relative to the last absolute
pad position by adding a '+' qualifier or to pad relative to the
right margin by using '-'. The padding truncates the string if
the specified position lies before the current position. Add the
'L' qualifier to change this.
< same as '%=' but just do truncation, do not fill with spaces
> mark the current text position for the next truncation. When
screen needs to do truncation, it tries to do it in a way that
the marked position gets moved to the specified percentage of the
output area. (The area starts from the last absolute pad position
and ends with the position specified by the truncation operator.)
The 'L' qualifier tells screen to mark the truncated parts with
''.
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{ attribute/color modifier string terminated by the next "}"
` Substitute with the output of a 'backtick' command. The length
qualifier is misused to identify one of the commands.
The 'c' and 'C' escape may be qualified with a '0' to make screen use
zero instead of space as fill character. The '0' qualifier also makes
the '=' escape use absolute positions. The 'n' and '=' escapes
understand a length qualifier (e.g. '%3n'), 'D' and 'M' can be
prefixed with 'L' to generate long names, 'w' and 'W' also show the
window flags if 'L' is given.
An attribute/color modifier is is used to change the attributes or the
color settings. Its format is "[attribute modifier] [color
description]". The attribute modifier must be prefixed by a change
type indicator if it can be confused with a color description. The
following change types are known:
+ add the specified set to the current attributes
- remove the set from the current attributes
! invert the set in the current attributes
= change the current attributes to the specified set
The attribute set can either be specified as a hexadecimal number or a
combination of the following letters:
d dim
u underline
b bold
r reverse
s standout
B blinking
Colors are coded either as a hexadecimal number or two letters
specifying the desired background and foreground color (in that
order). The following colors are known:
k black
r red
g green
y yellow
b blue
m magenta
c cyan
w white
d default color
. leave color unchanged
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The capitalized versions of the letter specify bright colors. You can
also use the pseudo-color 'i' to set just the brightness and leave the
color unchanged.
A one digit/letter color description is treated as foreground or
background color dependent on the current attributes: if reverse mode
is set, the background color is changed instead of the foreground
color. If you don't like this, prefix the color with a ".". If you
want the same behavior for two-letter color descriptions, also prefix
them with a ".".
As a special case, "%{-}" restores the attributes and colors that were
set before the last change was made (i.e., pops one level of the
color-change stack).
Examples:
set color to bright green
use bold red
clear all attributes, write in default color on yellow
background.
%-Lw%{= BW}%50>%n%f* %t%{-}%+Lw%<
The available windows centered at the current window and
truncated to the available width. The current window is displayed
white on blue. This can be used with "hardstatus
alwayslastline".
%?%F%{.R.}%?%3n %t%? [%h]%?
The window number and title and the window's hardstatus, if one
is set. Also use a red background if this is the active focus.
Useful for "caption string".
FLOW-CONTROL
Each window has a flow-control setting that determines how screen
deals with the XON and XOFF characters (and perhaps the interrupt
character). When flow-control is turned off, screen ignores the XON
and XOFF characters, which allows the user to send them to the current
program by simply typing them (useful for the emacs editor, for
instance). The trade-off is that it will take longer for output from
a "normal" program to pause in response to an XOFF. With flow-control
turned on, XON and XOFF characters are used to immediately pause the
output of the current window. You can still send these characters to
the current program, but you must use the appropriate two-character
screen commands (typically "C-a q" (xon) and "C-a s" (xoff)). The
xon/xoff commands are also useful for typing C-s and C-q past a
terminal that intercepts these characters.
Each window has an initial flow-control value set with either the -f
option or the "defflow" .screenrc command. Per default the windows are
set to automatic flow-switching. It can then be toggled between the
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three states 'fixed on', 'fixed off' and 'automatic' interactively
with the "flow" command bound to "C-a f".
The automatic flow-switching mode deals with flow control using the
TIOCPKT mode (like "rlogin" does). If the tty driver does not support
TIOCPKT, screen tries to find out the right mode based on the current
setting of the application keypad - when it is enabled, flow-control
is turned off and visa versa. Of course, you can still manipulate
flow-control manually when needed.
If you're running with flow-control enabled and find that pressing the
interrupt key (usually C-c) does not interrupt the display until
another 6-8 lines have scrolled by, try running screen with the
"interrupt" option (add the "interrupt" flag to the "flow" command in
your .screenrc, or use the -i command-line option). This causes the
output that screen has accumulated from the interrupted program to be
flushed. One disadvantage is that the virtual terminal's memory
contains the non-flushed version of the output, which in rare cases
can cause minor inaccuracies in the output. For example, if you
switch screens and return, or update the screen with "C-a l" you would
see the version of the output you would have gotten without
"interrupt" being on. Also, you might need to turn off flow-control
(or use auto-flow mode to turn it off automatically) when running a
program that expects you to type the interrupt character as input, as
it is possible to interrupt the output of the virtual terminal to your
physical terminal when flow-control is enabled. If this happens, a
simple refresh of the screen with "C-a l" will restore it. Give each
mode a try, and use whichever mode you find more comfortable.
TITLES (naming windows)
You can customize each window's name in the window display (viewed
with the "windows" command (C-a w)) by setting it with one of the
title commands. Normally the name displayed is the actual command
name of the program created in the window. However, it is sometimes
useful to distinguish various programs of the same name or to change
the name on-the-fly to reflect the current state of the window.
The default name for all shell windows can be set with the
"shelltitle" command in the .screenrc file, while all other windows
are created with a "screen" command and thus can have their name set
with the -t option. Interactively, there is the title-string escape-
sequence (<esc>kname<esc>\) and the "title" command (C-a A). The
former can be output from an application to control the window's name
under software control, and the latter will prompt for a name when
typed. You can also bind pre-defined names to keys with the "title"
command to set things quickly without prompting. Changing title bythis
escape sequence can be controlled by defdynamictitle and dynamictitle
commands.
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Finally, screen has a shell-specific heuristic that is enabled by
setting the window's name to "search|name" and arranging to have a
null title escape-sequence output as a part of your prompt. The
search portion specifies an end-of-prompt search string, while the
name portion specifies the default shell name for the window. If the
name ends in a `:' screen will add what it believes to be the current
command running in the window to the end of the window's shell name
(e.g. "name:cmd"). Otherwise the current command name supersedes the
shell name while it is running.
Here's how it works: you must modify your shell prompt to output a
null title-escape-sequence (<esc>k<esc>\) as a part of your prompt.
The last part of your prompt must be the same as the string you
specified for the search portion of the title. Once this is set up,
screen will use the title-escape-sequence to clear the previous
command name and get ready for the next command. Then, when a newline
is received from the shell, a search is made for the end of the
prompt. If found, it will grab the first word after the matched
string and use it as the command name. If the command name begins
with either '!', '%', or '^' screen will use the first word on the
following line (if found) in preference to the just-found name. This
helps csh users get better command names when using job control or
history recall commands.
Here's some .screenrc examples:
screen -t top 2 nice top
Adding this line to your .screenrc would start a nice-d version of the
"top" command in window 2 named "top" rather than "nice".
shelltitle '> |csh'
screen 1
These commands would start a shell with the given shelltitle. The
title specified is an auto-title that would expect the prompt and the
typed command to look something like the following:
/usr/joe/src/dir> trn
(it looks after the '> ' for the command name). The window status
would show the name "trn" while the command was running, and revert to
"csh" upon completion.
bind R screen -t '% |root:' su
Having this command in your .screenrc would bind the key sequence "C-a
R" to the "su" command and give it an auto-title name of "root:". For
this auto-title to work, the screen could look something like this:
% !em
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emacs file.c
Here the user typed the csh history command "!em" which ran the
previously entered "emacs" command. The window status would show
"root:emacs" during the execution of the command, and revert to simply
"root:" at its completion.
bind o title
bind E title ""
bind u title (unknown)
The first binding doesn't have any arguments, so it would prompt you
for a title. when you type "C-a o". The second binding would clear an
auto-title's current setting (C-a E). The third binding would set the
current window's title to "(unknown)" (C-a u).
One thing to keep in mind when adding a null title-escape-sequence to
your prompt is that some shells (like the csh) count all the non-
control characters as part of the prompt's length. If these invisible
characters aren't a multiple of 8 then backspacing over a tab will
result in an incorrect display. One way to get around this is to use
a prompt like this:
set prompt='^[[0000m^[k^[\% '
The escape-sequence "<esc>[0000m" not only normalizes the character
attributes, but all the zeros round the length of the invisible
characters up to 8. Bash users will probably want to echo the escape
sequence in the PROMPT_COMMAND:
PROMPT_COMMAND='printf "\033k\033\134"'
(I used "\134" to output a `\' because of a bug in bash v1.04).
THE VIRTUAL TERMINAL
Each window in a screen session emulates a VT100 terminal, with some
extra functions added. The VT100 emulator is hard-coded, no other
terminal types can be emulated.
Usually screen tries to emulate as much of the VT100/ANSI standard as
possible. But if your terminal lacks certain capabilities, the
emulation may not be complete. In these cases screen has to tell the
applications that some of the features are missing. This is no problem
on machines using termcap, because screen can use the $TERMCAP
variable to customize the standard screen termcap.
But if you do a rlogin on another machine or your machine supports
only terminfo this method fails. Because of this, screen offers a way
to deal with these cases. Here is how it works:
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When screen tries to figure out a terminal name for itself, it first
looks for an entry named "screen.<term>", where <term> is the contents
of your $TERM variable. If no such entry exists, screen tries
"screen" (or "screen-w" if the terminal is wide (132 cols or more)).
If even this entry cannot be found, "vt100" is used as a substitute.
The idea is that if you have a terminal which doesn't support an
important feature (e.g. delete char or clear to EOS) you can build a
new termcap/terminfo entry for screen (named "screen.<dumbterm>") in
which this capability has been disabled. If this entry is installed on
your machines you are able to do a rlogin and still keep the correct
termcap/terminfo entry. The terminal name is put in the $TERM
variable of all new windows. Screen also sets the $TERMCAP variable
reflecting the capabilities of the virtual terminal emulated. Notice
that, however, on machines using the terminfo database this variable
has no effect. Furthermore, the variable $WINDOW is set to the window
number of each window.
The actual set of capabilities supported by the virtual terminal
depends on the capabilities supported by the physical terminal. If,
for instance, the physical terminal does not support underscore mode,
screen does not put the `us' and `ue' capabilities into the window's
$TERMCAP variable, accordingly. However, a minimum number of
capabilities must be supported by a terminal in order to run screen;
namely scrolling, clear screen, and direct cursor addressing (in
addition, screen does not run on hardcopy terminals or on terminals
that over-strike).
Also, you can customize the $TERMCAP value used by screen by using the
"termcap" .screenrc command, or by defining the variable $SCREENCAP
prior to startup. When the is latter defined, its value will be
copied verbatim into each window's $TERMCAP variable. This can either
be the full terminal definition, or a filename where the terminal
"screen" (and/or "screen-w") is defined.
Note that screen honors the "terminfo" .screenrc command if the system
uses the terminfo database rather than termcap.
When the boolean `G0' capability is present in the termcap entry for
the terminal on which screen has been called, the terminal emulation
of screen supports multiple character sets. This allows an
application to make use of, for instance, the VT100 graphics character
set or national character sets. The following control functions from
ISO 2022 are supported: lock shift G0 (SI), lock shift G1 (SO), lock
shift G2, lock shift G3, single shift G2, and single shift G3. When a
virtual terminal is created or reset, the ASCII character set is
designated as G0 through G3. When the `G0' capability is present,
screen evaluates the capabilities `S0', `E0', and `C0' if present.
`S0' is the sequence the terminal uses to enable and start the
graphics character set rather than SI. `E0' is the corresponding
replacement for SO. `C0' gives a character by character translation
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string that is used during semi-graphics mode. This string is built
like the `acsc' terminfo capability.
When the `po' and `pf' capabilities are present in the terminal's
termcap entry, applications running in a screen window can send output
to the printer port of the terminal. This allows a user to have an
application in one window sending output to a printer connected to the
terminal, while all other windows are still active (the printer port
is enabled and disabled again for each chunk of output). As a side-
effect, programs running in different windows can send output to the
printer simultaneously. Data sent to the printer is not displayed in
the window. The info command displays a line starting `PRIN' while
the printer is active.
Screen maintains a hardstatus line for every window. If a window gets
selected, the display's hardstatus will be updated to match the
window's hardstatus line. If the display has no hardstatus the line
will be displayed as a standard screen message. The hardstatus line
can be changed with the ANSI Application Program Command (APC):
"ESC_<string>ESC\". As a convenience for xterm users the sequence
"ESC]0..2;<string>^G" is also accepted.
Some capabilities are only put into the $TERMCAP variable of the
virtual terminal if they can be efficiently implemented by the
physical terminal. For instance, `dl' (delete line) is only put into
the $TERMCAP variable if the terminal supports either delete line
itself or scrolling regions. Note that this may provoke confusion,
when the session is reattached on a different terminal, as the value
of $TERMCAP cannot be modified by parent processes.
The "alternate screen" capability is not enabled by default. Set the
altscreen .screenrc command to enable it.
The following is a list of control sequences recognized by screen.
"(V)" and "(A)" indicate VT100-specific and ANSI- or ISO-specific
functions, respectively.
ESC E Next Line
ESC D Index
ESC M Reverse Index
ESC H Horizontal Tab Set
ESC Z Send VT100 Identification String
ESC 7 (V) Save Cursor and Attributes
ESC 8 (V) Restore Cursor and Attributes
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ESC [s (A) Save Cursor and Attributes
ESC [u (A) Restore Cursor and Attributes
ESC c Reset to Initial State
ESC g Visual Bell
ESC Pn p Cursor Visibility (97801)
Pn = 6 Invisible
Pn = 7 Visible
ESC = (V) Application Keypad Mode
ESC > (V) Numeric Keypad Mode
ESC # 8 (V) Fill Screen with E's
ESC \ (A) String Terminator
ESC ^ (A) Privacy Message String (Message Line)
ESC ! Global Message String (Message Line)
ESC k A.k.a. Definition String
ESC P (A) Device Control String. Outputs a string
directly to the host terminal without
interpretation.
ESC _ (A) Application Program Command (Hardstatus)
ESC ] 0 ; string ^G (A) Operating System Command (Hardstatus, xterm
title hack)
ESC ] 83 ; cmd ^G (A) Execute screen command. This only works if
multi-user support is compiled into screen.
The pseudo-user ":window:" is used to check
the access control list. Use "addacl
:window: -rwx #?" to create a user with no
rights and allow only the needed commands.
Control-N (A) Lock Shift G1 (SO)
Control-O (A) Lock Shift G0 (SI)
ESC n (A) Lock Shift G2
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ESC o (A) Lock Shift G3
ESC N (A) Single Shift G2
ESC O (A) Single Shift G3
ESC ( Pcs (A) Designate character set as G0
ESC ) Pcs (A) Designate character set as G1
ESC * Pcs (A) Designate character set as G2
ESC + Pcs (A) Designate character set as G3
ESC [ Pn ; Pn H Direct Cursor Addressing
ESC [ Pn ; Pn f same as above
ESC [ Pn J Erase in Display
Pn = None or 0 From Cursor to
End of Screen
Pn = 1 From Beginning
of Screen to
Cursor
Pn = 2 Entire Screen
ESC [ Pn K Erase in Line
Pn = None or 0 From Cursor to
End of Line
Pn = 1 From Beginning
of Line to
Cursor
Pn = 2 Entire Line
ESC [ Pn X Erase character
ESC [ Pn A Cursor Up
ESC [ Pn B Cursor Down
ESC [ Pn C Cursor Right
ESC [ Pn D Cursor Left
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ESC [ Pn E Cursor next line
ESC [ Pn F Cursor previous line
ESC [ Pn G Cursor horizontal position
ESC [ Pn ` same as above
ESC [ Pn d Cursor vertical position
ESC [ Ps ;; Ps m Select Graphic Rendition
Ps = None or 0 Default
Rendition
Ps = 1 Bold
Ps = 2 (A) Faint
Ps = 3 (A) Standout Mode
(ANSI:
Italicized)
Ps = 4 Underlined
Ps = 5 Blinking
Ps = 7 Negative Image
Ps = 22 (A) Normal Intensity
Ps = 23 (A) Standout Mode
off (ANSI:
Italicized off)
Ps = 24 (A) Not Underlined
Ps = 25 (A) Not Blinking
Ps = 27 (A) Positive Image
Ps = 30 (A) Foreground Black
Ps = 31 (A) Foreground Red
Ps = 32 (A) Foreground Green
Ps = 33 (A) Foreground
Yellow
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Ps = 34 (A) Foreground Blue
Ps = 35 (A) Foreground
Magenta
Ps = 36 (A) Foreground Cyan
Ps = 37 (A) Foreground White
Ps = 39 (A) Foreground
Default
Ps = 40 (A) Background Black
Ps =
Ps = 49 (A) Background
Default
ESC [ Pn g Tab Clear
Pn = None or 0 Clear Tab at
Current Position
Pn = 3 Clear All Tabs
ESC [ Pn ; Pn r (V) Set Scrolling Region
ESC [ Pn I (A) Horizontal Tab
ESC [ Pn Z (A) Backward Tab
ESC [ Pn L (A) Insert Line
ESC [ Pn M (A) Delete Line
ESC [ Pn @ (A) Insert Character
ESC [ Pn P (A) Delete Character
ESC [ Pn S Scroll Scrolling Region Up
ESC [ Pn T Scroll Scrolling Region Down
ESC [ Pn ^ same as above
ESC [ Ps ;; Ps h Set Mode
ESC [ Ps ;; Ps l Reset Mode
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Ps = 4 (A) Insert Mode
Ps = 20 (A) Automatic
Linefeed Mode
Ps = 34 Normal Cursor
Visibility
Ps = ?1 (V) Application
Cursor Keys
Ps = ?3 (V) Change Terminal
Width to 132
columns
Ps = ?5 (V) Reverse Video
Ps = ?6 (V) Origin Mode
Ps = ?7 (V) Wrap Mode
Ps = ?9 X10 mouse
tracking
Ps = ?25 (V) Visible Cursor
Ps = ?47 Alternate Screen
(old xterm code)
Ps = ?1000 (V) VT200 mouse
tracking
Ps = ?1047 Alternate Screen
(new xterm code)
Ps = ?1049 Alternate Screen
(new xterm code)
ESC [ 5 i (A) Start relay to printer (ANSI Media Copy)
ESC [ 4 i (A) Stop relay to printer (ANSI Media Copy)
ESC [ 8 ; Ph ; Pw t Resize the window to `Ph' lines and `Pw'
columns (SunView special)
ESC [ c Send VT100 Identification String
ESC [ x Send Terminal Parameter Report
ESC [ > c Send VT220 Secondary Device Attributes
String
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ESC [ 6 n Send Cursor Position Report
INPUT TRANSLATION
In order to do a full VT100 emulation screen has to detect that a
sequence of characters in the input stream was generated by a keypress
on the user's keyboard and insert the VT100 style escape sequence.
Screen has a very flexible way of doing this by making it possible to
map arbitrary commands on arbitrary sequences of characters. For
standard VT100 emulation the command will always insert a string in
the input buffer of the window (see also command stuff in the command
table). Because the sequences generated by a keypress can change
after a reattach from a different terminal type, it is possible to
bind commands to the termcap name of the keys. Screen will insert the
correct binding after each reattach. See the bindkey command for
further details on the syntax and examples.
Here is the table of the default key bindings. The fourth is what
command is executed if the keyboard is switched into application mode.
allbox; l l l l. Key name Termcap nameCommandApp mode
Cursor up ku\033[A\033OA Cursor
down kd\033[B\033OB Cursor right kr\033[C\033OC
Cursor left kl\033[D\033OD Function key 0 k0\033[10~
Function key 1 k1\033OP Function key 2 k2\033OQ Function
key 3 k3\033OR Function key 4 k4\033OS Function key
5 k5\033[15~ Function key 6 k6\033[17~ Function key
7 k7\033[18~ Function key 8 k8\033[19~ Function key
9 k9\033[20~ Function key 10 k;\033[21~ Function key
11 F1\033[23~ Function key 12 F2\033[24~
Home kh\033[1~ End kH\033[4~
Insert kI\033[2~ Delete kD\033[3~ Page
up kP\033[5~ Page down kN\033[6~ Keypad
0 f00\033Op Keypad 1 f11\033Oq Keypad
2 f22\033Or Keypad 3 f33\033Os Keypad
4 f44\033Ot Keypad 5 f55\033Ou Keypad
6 f66\033Ov Keypad 7 f77\033Ow Keypad
8 f88\033Ox Keypad 9 f99\033Oy Keypad
+ f++\033Ok Keypad - f--\033Om Keypad
* f**\033Oj Keypad / f//\033Oo Keypad
= fq=\033OX Keypad . f..\033On Keypad
, f,,\033Ol Keypad enter fe\015\033OM
SPECIAL TERMINAL CAPABILITIES
The following table describes all terminal capabilities that are
recognized by screen and are not in the termcap(5) manual. You can
place these capabilities in your termcap entries (in `/etc/termcap')
or use them with the commands `termcap', `terminfo' and `termcapinfo'
in your screenrc files. It is often not possible to place these
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capabilities in the terminfo database.
LP (bool) Terminal has VT100 style margins (`magic margins'). Note
that this capability is obsolete because screen uses the
standard 'xn' instead.
Z0 (str) Change width to 132 columns.
Z1 (str) Change width to 80 columns.
WS (str) Resize display. This capability has the desired width and
height as arguments. SunView(tm) example: '\E[8;%d;%dt'.
NF (bool) Terminal doesn't need flow control. Send ^S and ^Q direct
to the application. Same as 'flow off'. The opposite of
this capability is 'nx'.
G0 (bool) Terminal can deal with ISO 2022 font selection sequences.
S0 (str) Switch charset 'G0' to the specified charset. Default is
'\E(%.'.
E0 (str) Switch charset 'G0' back to standard charset. Default is
'\E(B'.
C0 (str) Use the string as a conversion table for font '0'. See
the 'ac' capability for more details.
CS (str) Switch cursor-keys to application mode.
CE (str) Switch cursor-keys back to normal mode.
AN (bool) Turn on autonuke. See the 'autonuke' command for more
details.
OL (num) Set the output buffer limit. See the 'obuflimit' command
for more details.
KJ (str) Set the encoding of the terminal. See the 'encoding'
command for valid encodings.
AF (str) Change character foreground color in an ANSI conform way.
This capability will almost always be set to '\E[3%dm'
('\E[3%p1%dm' on terminfo machines).
AB (str) Same as 'AF', but change background color.
AX (bool) Does understand ANSI set default fg/bg color (\E[39m /
\E[49m).
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XC (str) Describe a translation of characters to strings depending
on the current font. More details follow in the next
section.
XT (bool) Terminal understands special xterm sequences (OSC, mouse
tracking).
C8 (bool) Terminal needs bold to display high-intensity colors
(e.g. Eterm).
TF (bool) Add missing capabilities to the termcap/info entry. (Set
by default).
CHARACTER TRANSLATION
Screen has a powerful mechanism to translate characters to arbitrary
strings depending on the current font and terminal type. Use this
feature if you want to work with a common standard character set (say
ISO8851-latin1) even on terminals that scatter the more unusual
characters over several national language font pages.
Syntax:
XC=<charset-mapping>{,,<charset-mapping>}
<charset-mapping> := <designator><template>{,<mapping>}
<mapping> := <char-to-be-mapped><template-arg>
The things in braces may be repeated any number of times.
A <charset-mapping> tells screen how to map characters in font
<designator> ('B': Ascii, 'A': UK, 'K': German, etc.) to strings.
Every <mapping> describes to what string a single character will be
translated. A template mechanism is used, as most of the time the
codes have a lot in common (for example strings to switch to and from
another charset). Each occurrence of '%' in <template> gets
substituted with the <template-arg> specified together with the
character. If your strings are not similar at all, then use '%' as a
template and place the full string in <template-arg>. A quoting
mechanism was added to make it possible to use a real '%'. The '\'
character quotes the special characters '\', '%', and ','.
Here is an example:
termcap hp700 'XC=B\E(K%\E(B,\304[,\326\\\\,\334]'
This tells screen how to translate ISOlatin1 (charset 'B') upper case
umlaut characters on a hp700 terminal that has a German charset.
'\304' gets translated to '\E(K[\E(B' and so on. Note that this line
gets parsed *three* times before the internal lookup table is built,
therefore a lot of quoting is needed to create a single '\'.
Another extension was added to allow more emulation: If a mapping
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translates the unquoted '%' char, it will be sent to the terminal
whenever screen switches to the corresponding <designator>. In this
special case the template is assumed to be just '%' because the
charset switch sequence and the character mappings normally haven't
much in common.
This example shows one use of the extension:
termcap xterm 'XC=K%,%\E(B,[\304,\\\\\326,]\334'
Here, a part of the German ('K') charset is emulated on an xterm. If
screen has to change to the 'K' charset, '\E(B' will be sent to the
terminal, i.e. the ASCII charset is used instead. The template is just
'%', so the mapping is straightforward: '[' to '\304', '\' to '\326',
and ']' to '\334'.
ENVIRONMENT
COLUMNS Number of columns on the terminal (overrides termcap
entry).
HOME Directory in which to look for .screenrc.
LINES Number of lines on the terminal (overrides termcap
entry).
LOCKPRG Screen lock program.
NETHACKOPTIONS Turns on nethack option.
PATH Used for locating programs to run.
SCREENCAP For customizing a terminal's TERMCAP value.
SCREENDIR Alternate socket directory.
SCREENRC Alternate user screenrc file.
SHELL Default shell program for opening windows (default
"/bin/sh"). See also "shell" .screenrc command.
STY Alternate socket name.
SYSSCREENRC Alternate system screenrc file.
TERM Terminal name.
TERMCAP Terminal description.
WINDOW Window number of a window (at creation time).
FILES
/screen-4.?.??/etc/screenrc
/screen-4.?.??/etc/etcscreenrc Examples in the screen distribution
package for private and global
initialization files.
$SYSSCREENRC
/usr/local/etc/screenrc screen initialization commands
$SCREENRC
$HOME/.screenrc Read in after
/usr/local/etc/screenrc
$SCREENDIR/S-<login>
/local/screens/S-<login> Socket directories (default)
/usr/tmp/screens/S-<login> Alternate socket directories.
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<socket directory>/.termcap Written by the "termcap" output
function
/usr/tmp/screens/screen-exchange or
/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/?/* or
/etc/termcap Terminal capability databases
/etc/utmp Login records
$LOCKPRG Program that locks a terminal.
SEE ALSO
termcap(5), utmp(5), vi(1), captoinfo(1), tic(1)
AUTHORS
Originally created by Oliver Laumann. For a long time maintained and
developed by Juergen Weigert, Michael Schroeder, Micah Cowan and
Sadrul Habib Chowdhury. This latest version was produced by Amadeusz
Slawinski <amade@asmblr.net> and Alexander Naumov
<alexander_naumov@opensuse.org>.
COPYLEFT
Copyright (c) 2015-2017
Juergen Weigert <jnweiger@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Alexander Naumov <alexander_naumov@opensuse.org>
Amadeusz Slawinski <amade@asmblr.net>
Copyright (c) 2010-2015
Juergen Weigert <jnweiger@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Sadrul Habib Chowdhury <sadrul@users.sourceforge.net>
Copyright (c) 2008, 2009
Juergen Weigert <jnweiger@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Michael Schroeder <mlschroe@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Micah Cowan <micah@cowan.name>
Sadrul Habib Chowdhury <sadrul@users.sourceforge.net>
Copyright (C) 1993-2003
Juergen Weigert <jnweiger@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Michael Schroeder <mlschroe@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Copyright (C) 1987 Oliver Laumann
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 3, 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.
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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
CONTRIBUTORS
Eric S. Raymond <esr@thyrsus.com>,
Thomas Renninger <treen@suse.com>,
Axel Beckert <abe@deuxchevaux.org>,
Ken Beal <kbeal@amber.ssd.csd.harris.com>,
Rudolf Koenig <rfkoenig@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>,
Toerless Eckert <eckert@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>,
Wayne Davison <davison@borland.com>,
Patrick Wolfe <pat@kai.com, kailand!pat>,
Bart Schaefer <schaefer@cse.ogi.edu>,
Nathan Glasser <nathan@brokaw.lcs.mit.edu>,
Larry W. Virden <lvirden@cas.org>,
Howard Chu <hyc@hanauma.jpl.nasa.gov>,
Tim MacKenzie <tym@dibbler.cs.monash.edu.au>,
Markku Jarvinen <mta@{cc,cs,ee}.tut.fi>,
Marc Boucher <marc@CAM.ORG>,
Doug Siebert <dsiebert@isca.uiowa.edu>,
Ken Stillson <stillson@tsfsrv.mitre.org>,
Ian Frechett <frechett@spot.Colorado.EDU>,
Brian Koehmstedt <bpk@gnu.ai.mit.edu>,
Don Smith <djs6015@ultb.isc.rit.edu>,
Frank van der Linden <vdlinden@fwi.uva.nl>,
Martin Schweikert <schweik@cpp.ob.open.de>,
David Vrona <dave@sashimi.lcu.com>,
E. Tye McQueen <tye%spillman.UUCP@uunet.uu.net>,
Matthew Green <mrg@eterna.com.au>,
Christopher Williams <cgw@pobox.com>,
Matt Mosley <mattm@access.digex.net>,
Gregory Neil Shapiro <gshapiro@wpi.WPI.EDU>,
Johannes Zellner <johannes@zellner.org>,
Pablo Averbuj <pablo@averbuj.com>.
AVAILABILITY
The latest official release of screen available via anonymous ftp from
ftp.gnu.org/gnu/screen/ or any other GNU distribution site. The home
site of screen is savannah.gnu.org/projects/screen/. If you want to
help, send a note to screen-devel@gnu.org.
BUGS
+ `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.
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+ It is not possible to change the environment variable $TERMCAP when
reattaching under a different terminal type.
+ The support of terminfo based systems is very limited. Adding extra
capabilities to $TERMCAP may not have any effects.
+ 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 "/etc/utmp".
+ Entries in "/etc/utmp" are not removed when 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.
+ When the modem line was hung up, 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.
+ If a password is set, the command line options -d and -D still
detach a session without asking.
+ Both "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.
+ When attaching to a multiuser session, the user's .screenrc file is
not sourced. Each user's personal settings have to be included in
the .screenrc file from which the session is booted, or have to be
changed manually.
+ A weird imagination is most useful to gain full advantage of all
the features.
+ Send bug-reports, fixes, enhancements, t-shirts, money, beer &
pizza to screen-devel@gnu.org.
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