Home / server / Questions / 237778
Accepted
Jarl
Asked: 2011-02-21 00:17:53 +0800 CST

How to prevent screen from terminating when command in window terminates

  • 772

When running 'screen ls' the screen stops with the text [screen is terminating]. I would like screen to keep the session alive and reattach to it to see the output of ls.

Of course the real thing is that I don't run screen ls, but rather a screen fsck ..., so I would like to ensure that the screen is not terminating when this command is finished.

I would love to have an answer that is useful for an already existing running screen session, so some interactive keys like C-a ... or C-a : (Enter command line mode)

gnu-screen

2 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    You can enter the zombie kr command after typing Ctrl-A:, to make a running screen keep the window open after the command finishes. The kr part is specifying what keys you want to use to control the window after its command has finished -- in this case, "k" to kill/close the window, or "r" to restart the command.

    • 9

  2. Can't you just start screen first and run fsck inside your screen session?

    Anyway, add this to your ~/.screenrc:

    zombie kr
verbose on

    and then screen will leave your zombie session open. You can then hit r to resurrect your session although in this case it will just run your command all over again which you probably don't want. Probably what you want to do is then hit ctrl-A <esc> to enter the screen scrollback mode and browse back in your previous output.

    • 7