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08 - What is tmux and how to use it in macOS

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By Christian Arzu
3 min read

Contents

YouTube video

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What is tmux and why do I use it?

  • NOTE TO SELF: Git access and private keys, access to my other repos
  • Tmux is a terminal multiplexer, I use it to create different windows and sessions to work on different tasks.
  • Tmux has what is known as the command mode. In this mode you enter tmux commands or shortcuts that perform different actions
  • To enter command mode you press ctrl+b
  • In the karabiner video we configured my keymappings, so I use hyper+b instead. It’s easier to type
  • Demonstration in the video, I cover:
    • How tmux is useful when sshing to multiple hosts
    • Synchronize commands across panes
    • Have 2 files open to compare or work with
    • Have different windows open with different workloads

Install

  • We already installed tmux when we ran the installed multiple apps with brew (video 3)
  • Notice the green line at the bottom
  • My tmux configuration file is already pointing to the file that we cloned from my dotfiles-latest repo as seen below
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cd && ls -al
  • So now I need to install the tmux plugin manager, so that the theme I have configured gets applied, and other tmux plugins are also installed
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git clone https://github.com/tmux-plugins/tpm ~/.tmux/plugins/tpm
  • Now we need to install the plugins
  • If you have issues installing the plugins below, close alacritty and open it again
    • Press ctrl+b in the terminal to execute tmux commands
    • Then capital I shift+i to install
  • Notice that the pane shows at the bottom

tmux configuration file

  • We’ll go over the tmux configuration file in the video. I have comments In the file that will help you navigate around and better use tmux

Delete tmux resurrect settings

  • I wanted to delete my resurrect data to start fresh with tmux, so all you need to do is delete this folder below. You can mv it instead of deleting it in case you want to back it up
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rm -rf ~/.local/share/tmux

Tmux basics

  • To start a new tmux session without sourcing the .tmux.conf file this is useful to see if your config is causing any issues
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tmux -f /dev/null
  • From inside tmux to view the list of all the commands run
    • ctrl+b?
  • Create a new session with a name outside tmux
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tmux new -s xcp
  • Create a new session with a name from within tmux
    • So press ctrl+b
    • Then :
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new -s dotfiles
  • Detach from the session (this even closes Alacritty for me)
    • ctrl+b d - from within tmux
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tmux detach
  • See list of sessions
    • ctrl+b s - from within tmux
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tmux ls
  • See list of windows and sessions
    • ctrl+b w
    • When in here, you can type x to kill a session and type yes at the bottom
  • Attach to a session
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2

tmux a -t xcp
tmux a -t 0
  • To create a new window inside a session
    • ctrl+b c
  • Kill current window (or just type exit on the terminal)
    • C-b &
  • To navigate between windows inside a session
    • ctrl+b n - next
    • ctrl+b p - previous (I remapped this to ‘m’)
    • ctrl+b # - specify a number
  • Maximize and minimize back a pane
    • ctrl+b m - I remapped this to ctrl+b M
  • Rename a session
    • ctrl+b $
  • Rename current window
    • ctrl+b ,
  • Scroll in a tmux pane
    • ctrl+[
    • Then scroll with vim navigation
    • When inside this mode you can also use the following and the cursor will be kept in a fixed position
      • shift J
      • shift K
    • When in this mode:
      • We can select text with v
      • And copy the text with y
      • This is because the bind-key -T copy-mode-vi 'v' send -X begin-selection lines in our tmux config file
    • q to stop scrolling
      • or ctrl+c
2024-macos-workflow
macos tutorial youtube video tmux
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