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Tmux is another one of those tools whose siren call I'd avoided for a good decade, continuing to rely on GNU Screen. Then, for the last time I reconnected to a

by cik 8y ago

Tmux is another one of those tools whose siren call I'd avoided for a good decade, continuing to rely on GNU Screen. Then, for the last time I reconnected to a split screen and screen lost my splits and tabs - it was enough for me. Two years ago I finally changed over and I haven't looked back. At this point, when I encounter something where I only have screen I'm rather annoyed by it - and I've set my tmux key mapping to basically mimic what I've been using screen for the last 20 years. For me, tmux replaced every single feature that I used in screen. On the other hand, I'd be genuinely happy if it existed on the older OSes I randomly have to frequent, even if it's understandably impossible.

another-cuppa 8y ago
Is tmux actually more reliable in this respect or have you just been lucky so far? I had a screen session running for three years with no problems.
- cik 8y ago
  Fair question. My environments are different now, so I have no need to have a session last that long. My longest screen session, like yours was years. My current longest tmux session goes back to April 23 2018. Admittedly, I'd hope to argue that if I keep sessions open that long I'm the problem.
- blunte 8y ago
  I have a tmux session that's been running for almost a year with no problems. I don't know how long it will run, but perfect performance for almost a year is good enough for me. My session has 8 tabs, and one of the tabs (my primary) has 14 sub windows (frames?) showing all kinds of good busy information.
branchless 8y ago
I too resisted, screen was great. But it had some pitfalls. I tried tmux, by the end of the day I was sold. Never restarted screen again. Tmux is an improved, more coherent screen.
lkbm 8y ago
The one thing keeping me from switching is the lack of command classes[0]. I want to be able to chain bindings, so "^a s a" does "ssh server-a", and "^a s b" does "ssh server-b". People keep telling me that tmux is better (though I still don't understand why), but I lean heavily on chained bindings and haven't found a solution in tmux. [0] http://aperiodic.net/screen/interface#command_classes http://aperiodic.net/screen/interface#command_classes
- cik 8y ago
  Totally fair, and I never missed it because I have a different approach. I always open the shell and execute my commands in it - regardless of screen/tmux, a straight bash shell, or xterms(etc). I have a crazy amount of automatic generating shell commands, so that I basically need bash --login to trigger anyways.

by cik 8y ago

another-cuppa 8y ago

Is tmux actually more reliable in this respect or have you just been lucky so far? I had a screen session running for three years with no problems.

cik 8y ago
Fair question. My environments are different now, so I have no need to have a session last that long. My longest screen session, like yours was years. My current longest tmux session goes back to April 23 2018. Admittedly, I'd hope to argue that if I keep sessions open that long I'm the problem.
blunte 8y ago
I have a tmux session that's been running for almost a year with no problems. I don't know how long it will run, but perfect performance for almost a year is good enough for me. My session has 8 tabs, and one of the tabs (my primary) has 14 sub windows (frames?) showing all kinds of good busy information.

branchless 8y ago

I too resisted, screen was great. But it had some pitfalls. I tried tmux, by the end of the day I was sold. Never restarted screen again. Tmux is an improved, more coherent screen.

lkbm 8y ago

The one thing keeping me from switching is the lack of command classes[0]. I want to be able to chain bindings, so "^a s a" does "ssh server-a", and "^a s b" does "ssh server-b". People keep telling me that tmux is better (though I still don't understand why), but I lean heavily on chained bindings and haven't found a solution in tmux. [0] http://aperiodic.net/screen/interface#command_classes http://aperiodic.net/screen/interface#command_classes

cik 8y ago
Totally fair, and I never missed it because I have a different approach. I always open the shell and execute my commands in it - regardless of screen/tmux, a straight bash shell, or xterms(etc). I have a crazy amount of automatic generating shell commands, so that I basically need bash --login to trigger anyways.