Tmux Sessions, Windows, and Panes
In this post, I’m going to summarize the first chapter of tmux 3. Productive Mouse-Free Development by Brian P. Hogan, published by The Pragmatic Bookshelf. As in yesterday’s post, I’m focusing on the commands and their purpose. Since none of the commands require elevated privileges, I’m goint to omit the $ prompt in front of them.
Command use a Prefix, which is Ctrl-b (press those keys together) by default, and will be displayed as Prefix.
Check the tmux version number:
tmux -V
Start tmux:
tmux
Sessions
Create a session with the name basic:
tmux new-session -s basic
The new-session command can be abbreviated as new:
tmux new -s basic
Detach from the running session using Prefix d (i.e. first press the prefix, release, and then press d).
List existing tmux sessions (abbreviated):
tmux list-sessions
tmux ls
Attach to the last tmux session:
tmux attach
Attach to a specific tmux session by its name, e.g. basic:
tmux attach -t basic
Create a detached session called additional (“in the background”):
tmux new -s additional -d
End a session, e.g. basic:
tmux kill-session -t basic
Windows
Start tmux with a named window (shell) in a session called multiwindow:
tmux new -s multiwindow -n shell
Create a window in the current session: Prefix c.
Rename the current window: Prefix ,.
Move to the next window: Prefix n.
Move to the previous window: Prefix p.
Move to the nth window (first, second, …): Prefix 0, Prefix 1, …
Display a list of windows in a menu: Prefix w.
Find a window by its name: Prefix f.
Close a window: Prefix &.
Panes
Split the window (or pane) into a left and a right pane: Prefix %.
Split the window (or pane) into a top and a bottom pane: Prefix ".
Cycle through the panes: Prefix o.
Move to another pane given a direction:
- left:
Prefix← - right :
Prefix→ - up:
Prefix↑ - down:
Prefix↓
Apply a pre-defined layout: Prefix Space.
Kill the current pane: Prefix x.
Miscellaneous
Enter command mode: Prefix :.
List key bindings and their commands: Prefix ?.
The next chapter is about configuring tmux, so stay tuned.