GNU screen reference cheat sheet

README.md

GNU screen quick reference

http://aperiodic.net/screen/quick_reference

How to Navigate, copy & paste content?

within screen sessions: Cntl a + [ : To start navigation using up/down arrow Press Space bar: To select content starting position Press Space bar again: To select a block of content Cntl a + ] : To paste the selected content

Getting in

start a new screen session with session name	screen -S <name>
list running sessions/screens	screen -ls
attach to a running session	screen -x
… to session with name	screen -r <name>
the “ultimate attach”	screen -dRR (Attaches to a screen session. If the session is attached elsewhere, detaches that other display. If no session exists, creates one. If multiple sessions exist, uses the first one.)

detach a running session

screen -d <name>

Escape key

All screen commands are prefixed by an escape key, by default C-a (that's Control-a, sometimes written ^a). To send a literal C-a to the programs in screen, use C-a a. This is useful when working with screen within screen. For example C-a a n will move screen to a new window on the screen within screen.

Getting out

detach	C-a d
detach and logout (quick exit)	C-a D D
exit screen	C-a \ Exit all of the programs in screen. (not recommended)
force-exit screen	C-a C-\ (not recommended)
getting out of the screen session	exit

Help

See help

C-a ? (lists keybindings)

Window management

create new window	C-a c
change to last-visited active window	C-a C-a (commonly used to flip-flop between two windows)
change to window by number	C-a <number> (only for windows 0 to 9)
change to window by number or name	C-a ' <number or title>
change to next window in list	C-a n or C-a <space>
change to previous window in list	C-a p or C-a <backspace>
see window list	C-a " (allows you to select a window to change to)
show window bar	C-a w (if you don't have window bar)
close current window	Close all applications in the current window (including shell)
kill current window	C-a k (not recommended)
kill all windows	C-a \ (not recommended)
rename current window	C-a A

Split screen

split display horizontally	C-a S
split display vertically	C-a | or C-a V (for the vanilla vertical screen patch)
jump to next display region	C-a tab
remove current region	C-a X
remove all regions but the current one	C-a Q

Scripting

send a command to a named session	screen -S <name> -X <command>
create a new window and run ping example.com	screen -S <name> -X screen ping example.com
stuff characters into the input buffer using bash to expand a newline character (from here)	screen -S <name> [-p <page>] -X stuff $'quit\r'
a full example	# run bash within screen screen -AmdS bash_shell bash # run top within that bash session screen -S bash_shell -p 0 -X stuff $'top\r'   # ... some time later   # stuff 'q' to tell top to quit screen -S bash_shell -X stuff 'q' # stuff 'exit\n' to exit bash session screen -S bash_shell -X stuff $'exit\r'

Misc

redraw window	C-a C-l
enter copy mode	C-a [ or C-a <esc> (also used for viewing scrollback buffer)
paste	C-a ]
monitor window for activity	C-a M
monitor window for silence	C-a _
enter digraph (for producing non-ASCII characters)	C-a C-v
lock (password protect) display	C-a x
enter screen command	C-a :
enable logging in the screen session	C-a H
getting out of the screen session	exit

Scrollback-buffer

half page up	C-u
half page down	C-d
back	C-b
forward	C-f
cursor left/down/up/right	h/j/k/l