TMUX(1)

General Commands Manual

TMUX(1)

NAME

tmux —

terminal multiplexer

SYNOPSIS

tmux [-vV] [-c client-tty] [-S socket-path] [-s session-name] command [arguments]

DESCRIPTION

tmux is a terminal multiplexer; it enables a number of terminals (or windows) to be accessed and controlled from a single terminal.

tmux runs as a server-client system. A server is created automatically when necessary and holds a number of sessions, each of which may have a number of windows linked to it. Any number of clients may connect to a session, or the server may be controlled by issuing commands with tmux. Communication takes place through a socket, by default placed in /tmp.

The options are as follows:

-c client-tty: Apply command to the client on the given tty. Clients may be listed with the list-clients command (see below). This option does not apply to all commands.
-S socket-path: Specify an alternative path to the server socket. The default is /tmp/tmux-UID, where UID is the uid of the user who invoked tmux.
-s session-name: Apply command to the session named session-name. This option does not apply to all commands. If it is omitted and tmux is invoked from a running tmux client, the session the containing client is connected to will be used; otherwise, if only one session exists, it is chosen, or if multiple sessions exist, an error is generated.
-v: Request verbose logging. This option may be specified multiple times for increasing verbosity. Log messages will be saved into tmux-client-PID.log and tmux-server-PID.log files in the current directory, where PID is the pid of the server or client process.
command [arguments]: This specifies one of a set of commands used to control tmux, and described in the following sections.

KEY BINDINGS

tmux may be controlled from an attached client by using a key combination of a prefix, ‘^B’ (ctrl-B) by default, followed by a command key.

Some of the default key bindings include:

‘d’: Detach current client.
‘c’: Create new window.
‘n’: Change to next window in the current session.
‘p’: Change to previous window in the current session.
‘l’: Move to last (previously selected) window in the current session.
‘?’: List current key bindings.

A complete list may be obtained with the list-keys command (bound to ‘?’ by default). Key bindings may be changed with the bind-key and unbind-key commands.

COMMANDS

tmux supports the following commands:

attach-session [-d]

(alias: attach)

Create a new client in the current terminal and attach it to a session. If -d is specified, any other clients attached to the session are detached.

bind-key key command [arguments]

(alias: bind)

Bind key key to command.

detach-client

(alias: detach)

Detach the current client if bound to a key, or the specified client with -c.

has-session

(alias: has)

Report an error and exit with 1 if the specified session does not exist. If it does exist, exit with 0.

kill-session

Destroy the given session, closing any windows linked to it and no other sessions, and detaching all clients attached to it.

kill-window [-i index]

(alias: killw)

Kill the current window or the window at index, removing it from any sessions to which it is linked.

last-window

(alias: last)

Select the last (previously selected) window.

link-window [-dk] [-i destination-index] source-name source-index

(alias: linkw)

Link the window at source-index in session source-name into the specified session. If destination-index is specified and no window exists with that index, the window is linked at that index. If -k is given and a window exists at destination-index, it is killed, otherwise an error is generated. If -d is given, the newly linked window is not selected.

list-clients

(alias: lsc)

List all clients attached to the server.

list-keys

(alias: lsk)

List all key bindings.

list-sessions

(alias: ls)

List all sessions managed by the server.

list-windows

(alias: lsw)

List all windows.

new-session [-d] [-s session-name] [-n window-name] [command]

(alias: new)

Create a new session with name session-name. The new session is attached to the current terminal unless -d is given. window-name and command are the name of and command to execute in the initial window.

new-window [-d] [-i index] [-n name] [command]

(alias: neww)

Create a new window. If -d is given, the session does not make the new window the current window. index and name are the index of the new window in the session and the name of the new window. command is the command to execute. If index is not specified, the first free index is used. If command is not specified, the default command is used.

The TERM environment variable must be set to “screen” for all program running inside tmux. New windows will automatically have “TERM=screen” added to their environment, but care must be taken not to reset this in shell start-up files.

next-window

(alias: next)

Move to the next window in the session.

previous-window

(alias: prev)

Move to the previous window in the session.

refresh-client

(alias: refresh)

Refresh the current client if bound to a key, or a single client if one given with -c.

rename-session new-name

(alias: rename)

Rename the session to new-name.

rename-window [-i index] new-name

(alias: renamew)

Rename the current window, or the window at index if specifed, to new-name.

select-window index

(alias: selectw)

Select the window at index.

send-prefix

Send the prefix key to a window as if it was pressed. This is ignored unless bound to a key.

set-option option value

(alias: set)

Set an option. Possible options are:

prefix key: Set the current prefix key.
status [on | off]: Show or hide the status line.
status-fg colour: Set status line foreground colour, where colour is one of: black, red, green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan, white or default.
status-bg colour: Set status line backgroun colour.
bell-action [any | none | current]: Set action on window bell. any means a bell in any window linked to a session causes a bell in the current window of that session, none means all bells are ignored and current means only bell in windows other than the current window are ignored.
default-command command: Sets the command used for new windows (if not specified when the window is created) to command. The default is “exec $SHELL”.

swap-window [-i destination-index] source-name source-index