Hi all, I try to use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) whenever possible, even though I have VMware and VirtualBox available. One thing that WSL terminal lacks is "tab" that all other terminals have. So, that calls for Screen and Tmux. But, which one? And, why? -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
tmux - more modern, less crufty. If that's too short an answer, look at configuration examples for screen vs. tmux: screen's configuration is so arcane it's impossible to read. The absolute worst is attempting to configure the status bar (assuming you use that). tmux's config isn't great, but a normal human being has some hope of actually reading it. You should also look at Byobu ( http://byobu.co/ ) - I prefer my terminal multiplexer raw, but you may not. On Thu, 20 Jun 2019 at 23:24, William Park via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I try to use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) whenever possible, even though I have VMware and VirtualBox available. One thing that WSL terminal lacks is "tab" that all other terminals have. So, that calls for Screen and Tmux. But, which one? And, why? -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca> --- Talk Mailing List talk@gtalug.org https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
-- Giles https://www.gilesorr.com/ gilesorr@gmail.com
On Fri, Jun 21, 2019, 3:42 PM Giles Orr via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
tmux - more modern, less crufty.
Screen still supports RS-232 input, so there are some extra use cases it covers, that matter not to 99% of us. Screen is GNU licensed, tmux is BSD licensed, again, mattering to probably 1% of us. The package for tmux is about 1/2 the size of that for Screen (Debian Sid, amd64), while installed, it's 2/3 the size. Possibly smaller in memory footprint; that's a difference of more practical value. On modern systems, that difference may not much matter either. I used to use Screen, shifted to tmux perhaps 8 or so years ago, and haven't had any complaints. I think it's a bit easier to write scripts to manipulate tmux environments (which is not unlike what Giles noted about the scripting language of Screen). There's also a likelihood that there are more people still working on tmux. None of these factors point at dominant arguments, just at small possible advantages.
On 2019-06-20 11:23 p.m., William Park via talk wrote:
I try to use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) whenever possible, even though I have VMware and VirtualBox available. One thing that WSL terminal lacks is "tab" that all other terminals have. So, that calls for Screen and Tmux. But, which one? And, why?
Another option: an X server on the windows box and xterm (or whatever terminal you want). As many windows as you want. Sensible(ish) cut and paste, unlike the WSL terminal. There are rumours that WSL will get a major upgrade very soon, with a native terminal with all the features. I still use screen, as: 1) I know its shortcomings, and I don't want to learn about tmux's; 2) I'm one of the very few users of screen's serial capabilities. It's a frankly crap serial terminal, but it's easy to install and good enough for debug work. You still have to fight with stty to get fancy settings, like the 7M1 (yep: "M", not "N") that one of my bits of ancient hardware requires. cheers, Stewart
On Sun, Jun 23, 2019 at 04:10:42PM -0400, Stewart C. Russell via talk wrote:
On 2019-06-20 11:23 p.m., William Park via talk wrote:
I try to use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) whenever possible, even though I have VMware and VirtualBox available. One thing that WSL terminal lacks is "tab" that all other terminals have. So, that calls for Screen and Tmux. But, which one? And, why?
Another option: an X server on the windows box and xterm (or whatever terminal you want). As many windows as you want. Sensible(ish) cut and paste, unlike the WSL terminal.
There are rumours that WSL will get a major upgrade very soon, with a native terminal with all the features.
Microsoft name for the current terminal is "Windows Console", I'm told. The new terminal is "Windows Terminal". I tried it. I know it's "preview", but all it does is crash on me. It starts up with Power Shell tab, and you can create Power Shell, Cmd, or WSL tabs later. -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
On Sun, Jun 23, 2019 at 11:07:38PM -0400, William Park via talk wrote:
Microsoft name for the current terminal is "Windows Console", I'm told. The new terminal is "Windows Terminal". I tried it. I know it's "preview", but all it does is crash on me. It starts up with Power Shell tab, and you can create Power Shell, Cmd, or WSL tabs later.
So far it is working fine for me. Maybe it depends on the windows build you run it on. -- Len Sorensen
I'm just back from The Perl Conference in Pittsburgh where I saw a great talk on tmux. As a long-time (20 years) user of screen, I was mighty impressed. Being able to have an edit window in one pane and a bash window in the other pane is fantastic (and what Emacs users have had forever). There's going to be a learning curve, but I think it's wonderful -- you can even look at https://tmuxcheatsheet.com/ for some shortcuts. On Thu, Jun 20, 2019 at 11:24 PM William Park via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I try to use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) whenever possible, even though I have VMware and VirtualBox available. One thing that WSL terminal lacks is "tab" that all other terminals have. So, that calls for Screen and Tmux. But, which one? And, why? -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca> --- Talk Mailing List talk@gtalug.org https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
-- Alex Beamish Software Developer / https://ca.linkedin.com/in/alex-beamish-5111ba3 Speaker Wrangler / Toronto Perlmongers / http://to.pm.org/ Baritone, Operations Manager / Toronto Northern Lights, 2013 Champions / www.northernlightschorus.com Certified Contest Administrator / Barbershop Harmony Society / www.barbershop.org
participants (6)
-
Alex Beamish -
Christopher Browne -
Giles Orr -
lsorense＠csclub.uwaterloo.ca -
Stewart C. Russell -
William Park