GNU screen usage
This is a summary of some common command-line options and
keystrokes for use in the terminal multiplexer GNU screen.
For more details, see screen’s man page. All commands
(except in copy/scrollback mode or command-line mode)
start with the command character, which is assumed here to
be the default Ctrl+A (denoted here as “^a”).
Command-line options
screen Open up a new window with a command shell in it.
screen -D -R
Reattach a detached screen session.
screen -t Fooing foo bar baz
Create a new window, run the command “foo” with
arguments “bar” and “baz” in it, and title it
“Fooing”.
Basic command-character commands
^a ? Help.
^a a Send the command character itself (“^a”) to the
program running in the current window.
^a “ Present a list of all windows for selection.
Use the arrow or number keys (or vi- or
Emacs-style cursor keys) to highlight a window
and press <Enter> to switch to it.
^a 0 Switch to window number 0 (works with 0-9).
^a ^a Toggle to the window displayed previously. (If
you’re using another command character,
substitute it for both these “^a”s.)
^a A Change the current window’s title.
^a c Create a new window with a shell and switch to
that window.
^a <Esc> Enter copy/scrollback mode. (See
“Copy/scrollback mode” section below.)
^a ] Send the contents of the paste buffer to the
program running in the current window. (See
“Copy/scrollback mode” section below.)
^a t Show time, date, hostname, and some other stuff.
^a @ Do nothing. (Useful when you hit “^a” by
mistake.)
^a : Enter command line mode. (For example,
“^a :number 7” changes the window number of the
current window to 7. See the man page for more
details.)
^a ^z Suspend screen. (You will be back at the shell
you started screen from.)
^a d Detach screen. (Do this before you log out —
you will be back at the shell you started screen
from.)
Copy/scrollback mode
h,j,k,l Move cursor left, down, up, right (as in vi).
Regular arrow keys also work.
^b Page up (<PageUp> key also works).
^f Page down (<PageDown> key also works).
<Space> Set mark. When the second mark is set, the text
between the two marks will be put into screen’s
paste buffer and copy/scrollback mode will be
exited.
^ Move to first nonwhitespace character on current
line.
$ Move to last nonwhitespace character on current
line.
0 Move to leftmost column.
c Set the left margin for block-mode copying.
C Set the right margin for block-mode copying.
x Exchange the first mark with the current cursor
position. This is good for moving an already
set mark.
<Esc> Exit copy/scrollback mode. (Any key that
doesn’t have another meaning will do this.)
Regions
Regions let you view two or more screen windows at the
same time.
^a S Split the current region into two new ones.
(The blank window will be displayed in the new
region until you use one of the window selection
commands.)
^a <Tab> Switch focus to the next region.
^a Q Delete all regions but the current one. (This
does not destroy any windows.)
