Working with the Screen Command¶

Various times when working on remote servers, they're configured to automatically log you out after a certain period of inactivity.

This can be annoying to say the least when you're running a command and it takes a long time to complete.

screen is a good way of running that command because even if you've been logged out, the screen session stays active and the command carries on executing within the screen session.

It's another useful tool to have in your back pocket.

Let's have a look at how we can start managing screen sessions.

Starting a New Screen Session¶

In order to start a new screen session, you simply type the command screen with no parameters.

You are then presented with a screen session that looks very much like your standard terminal. There is a difference though - screen only keeps what you can see on your terminal. You cannot scroll back through output that has run off of the screen like you can with a terminal. So if you need the output, or might want to check something in the output, make sure any commands you run pipe or redirect their output to a file you can investigate after the command has completed.

Detaching From a Screen Session¶

While a long running command is running, or at any other time, you can detach from the screen session to return to your terminal.

Press Ctrl-A and release, then press d to detach. Detaching from a session does not stop the screen session running.

Listing and Reattaching to Screen Sessions¶

You can see what screen sessions are currently running for the current user using screen -ls. This will list the sessions that are currently running.

You can re-attach to any session in the list by running screen -r full.session.id.

Killing a Screen Session¶

When you've finished with a screen session, you can kill it so it is no longer running,

Press Ctrl-A and release, then press k to kill the screen session. Confirm the question of Do you want to kill this session by pressing y.

More Information¶

screen is really powerful. There's lots more you can do with it. For the definitive guide, type man screen to read the manual for screen. There's loads of information in there.

It makes a great serial line monitor for example when you're trying to debug serial communications.