GNU/Screen Features

This is just a personal reminder

Copy pasted from lists.gnu.org

Hi Screen Users,

you probably wonder why the new version of screen is not already available. Well, it got delayed a bit because of a couple of new features I've added. The development version is available from GNU savanna:

cvs -z3 -d:pserver:address@hidden:/sources/screen co screen

Here are the new features:

  • vertical split, complete with resizing

    ^A | split vertically

    resize [-l] [-h] [-v]

    -l : resize is local to slice -h : resize horizontally -v : resize vertically

    amount: 10 resize to size 10 amount: +10 make 10 bigger amount: -10 make 10 smaller amount: 10% make it 10% of all amount: = make all windows equal

  • better resize code using weights

    the layout will stay in shape even after heavy resizing

  • window groups

    currently a bit ugly to create: screen -t //group creates a group named

    a group is a subset of windows, ^Aw will only display the current group and next/prev will not leave the group. Use ^A" to list all windows of the current group (this also leaves to group, so that next/prev or a second ^A" will show the other windows.

  • layouts

    A layout stores the current setup of the display, i.e. all the slices and the window assignments.

    layout save Desktop1

    will save the current setup under the name "Desktop1". If you detach and reattach later on, the layout will automatically be restored. "Desktop1" will become the current layout.

    layout autosave off

    This turns the autosafe feature off. Layouts are automatically saved if autosave is on and the user detachs or switches to another layout.

    layout new Desktop2

    Create a new empty layout named "Desktop2".

    layout name "foo"

    Rename the current layout to "foo".

    layout next layout prev layout load "name"

    Load the next/prev layout / the layout named "name".

    layout attach :last layout attach "name"

    Set the layout used when somebody is attaching. Default is ":last", this is the layout that was current when the last detach was done.

    Besides the restoring of the screen on re-attach, layouts can be used to implement a kind of "virtual desktop" in screen. Say you put "layout save Desktop1" in your ~/.screenrc. If you need a new Desktop, do "^A:layout new Desktop2". You can then use "layout next" to switch between both layouts.

So, feedback welcome. You probably have a lot of suggestions and enhancement requests. Sorry that development is a bit slow at the moment due to not enough spare time...

Cheers, Michael.