tmux 2: Productive Mouse-Free Development

Book Details

  • Full Title: tmux 2: Productive Mouse-Free Development

  • Author: Brian P. Hogan

  • ISBN/URL: 978-1-68050-221-3

  • Reading Period: 2019.08

  • Source: Referred to in Modern Vim (ISBN: 13:978-1-68050-262-6)

General Review

  • Read this book if you want to get a sense of the basic usage of tmux, and the sensible default set of configurations.

Specific Takeaways

  • tmux is actually a full-featured software capable of more than just managing screens and maintaining sessions.

    • Its ability to scroll back (and search) the console output without the use of mouse gives potential productivity boost.

To Internalise Now

  • Use <prefix> ? to bring up the key bindings

  • By default, keys will be bound into the prefix group, so bind h set-option -g status will bind the <prefix> h to toggle the status bar

  • To rebind the prefix to ` key, use unbind C-b, set-option -g prefix `, followed by bind ` send-prefix

  • To use a different shell, use something like: set-option -g default-shell /usr/bin/zsh

  • To scroll back in the buffer (i.e., activate copy mode), use <prefix> [

To Learn/Do Soon

  • Come up with a sensible .tmux.conf for myself, and starting using it

To Revisit When Necessary

  • How to configure different sessions for different workflow (e.g., when opening a tmux in a certain project, it will start the development server in one window, and the editor in another etc.)

  • How to move windows and panes around

  • How to configure tmux to copy and paste intuitively with system clipboards