GNU Screen Config

Note: This post is archived. I now use tmux (and many distros ship nice screen configs now).

Over the last few years using screen I have stolen bits and pieces from other screen configuration files. Recently, I found the one below, which is very useful and works well.

The configuration below should be put in your ~/.screenrc file. The bindkey lines will set Alt-, and Alt-. (the same keys as < and > on a QWERTY keyboard) to move between windows left and right.

# Look and feel
caption always "%{= bb}%{+b w}Screen: %n | %h %=%t %c"
hardstatus alwayslastline "%-Lw%{= BW}%50>%n%f* %t%{-}%+Lw%<"

# Our warning of activity
activity "Activity in %t(%n)"

# Left Right meta key mods
#ALT-,. and ALT-<>
bindkey "^[<" eval number !echo $WINDOW-1|bc
bindkey "^[>" eval number !echo $WINDOW+1|bc
bindkey "^[," prev
bindkey "^[." next

To activate the caption output, the following should added to your ~/.bashrc file also:

# Change the window title of X terminals
case $TERM in
screen)
    PROMPT_COMMAND='echo -ne "\033_${USER}@${HOSTNAME%%.*}:${PWD/$HOME/~}\033\\"'
    ;;
esac

With the above activated in your ~/.bashrc (don’t forget to restart screen!), you should notice directory and process information appear just above the window tabs.