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https://github.com/deadpixi/mtm

Perhaps the smallest useful terminal multiplexer in the world.
https://github.com/deadpixi/mtm

c console-app console-application multiplexer terminal terminal-emulators

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Perhaps the smallest useful terminal multiplexer in the world.

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README 

        
Introduction

============



mtm is the Micro Terminal Multiplexer, a terminal multiplexer.



It has four major features/principles:



Simplicity

    There are only a few commands, two of which are hardly ever used.

    There are no modes, no dozens of commands, no crazy feature list.



Compatibility

    mtm emulates a classic ANSI text terminal.  That means it should

    work out of the box on essentially all terminfo/termcap-based systems

    (even pretty old ones), without needing to install a new termcap entry.



Size

    mtm is small.

    The entire project is around 1000 lines of code.



Stability

    mtm is "finished" as it is now.  You don't need to worry about it

    changing on you unexpectedly.  The only changes that can happen at

    this point are:



    - Bug fixes.

    - Translation improvements.

    - Accessibility improvements.

    - Fixes to keep it working on modern OSes.



Community

=========



Rob posts updates about mtm on Twitter at http://twitter.com/TheKingAdRob.



Installation

============

Installation and configuration is fairly simple:



- You need ncursesw.

  If you want to support terminal resizing, ncursesw needs to be

  compiled with its internal SIGWINCH handler; this is true for most

  precompiled distributions.  Other curses implementations might work,

  but have not been tested.

- Edit the variables at the top of the Makefile if you need to

  (you probably don't).

- If you want to change the default keybindings or other compile-time flags,

  copy `config.def.h` to `config.h` and edit the copy. Otherwise the build

  process will use the defaults.

- Run::



    make



  or::



    make CURSESLIB=curses



  or::



    make HEADERS='-DNCURSESW_INCLUDE_H=""'



  whichever works for you.

- Run `make install` if desired.



Usage

=====



Usage is simple::



    mtm [-T NAME] [-t NAME] [-c KEY]



The `-T` flag tells mtm to assume a different kind of host terminal.



The `-t` flag tells mtm what terminal type to advertise itself as.

Note that this doesn't change how mtm interprets control sequences; it

simply controls what the `TERM` environment variable is set to.



The `-c` flag lets you specify a keyboard character to use as the "command

prefix" for mtm when modified with *control* (see below).  By default,

this is `g`.



Once inside mtm, things pretty much work like any other terminal.  However,

mtm lets you split up the terminal into multiple virtual terminals.



At any given moment, exactly one virtual terminal is *focused*.  It is

to this terminal that keyboad input is sent.  The focused terminal is

indicated by the location of the cursor.



The following commands are recognized in mtm, when preceded by the command

prefix (by default *ctrl-g*):



Up/Down/Left/Right Arrow

    Focus the virtual terminal above/below/to the left of/to the right of

    the currently focused terminal.



o

    Focus the previously-focused virtual terminal.



h / v

    Split the focused virtual terminal in half horizontally/vertically,

    creating a new virtual terminal to the right/below.  The new virtual

    terminal is focused.



w

    Delete the focused virtual terminal.  Some other nearby virtual

    terminal will become focused if there are any left.  mtm will exit

    once all virtual terminals are closed.  Virtual terminals will also

    close if the program started inside them exits.



l

    Redraw the screen.



PgUp/PgDown/End

    Scroll the screen back/forward half a screenful, or recenter the

    screen on the actual terminal.



That's it.  There aren't dozens of commands, there are no modes, there's

nothing else to learn.



(Note that these keybindings can be changed at compile time.)



Screenshots

-----------

mtm running three instances of `tine `_



.. image:: screenshot2.png



mtm running various other programs



.. image:: screenshot.png



mtm showing its compatibility



.. image:: vttest1.png

.. image:: vttest2.png



Compatibility

=============

(Note that you only need to read this section if you're curious.  mtm should

just work out-of-the-box for you, thanks to the efforts of the various

hackers over the years to make terminal-independence a reality.)



By default, mtm advertises itself as a `screen-bce` terminal.  This is what `GNU

screen` and `tmux` advertise themselves as, and is a well-known terminal

type that has been in the default terminfo database for decades.



(Note that this should not be taken to imply that anyone involved in the

`GNU screen` or `tmux` projects endorses or otherwise has anything to do

with mtm, and vice-versa. Their work is excellent, though, and you should

definitely check it out.)



The (optional!) `mtm` Terminal Types

------------------------

mtm comes with a terminfo description file called mtm.ti.  This file

describes all of the features supported by mtm.



If you want to install this terminal type, use the `tic` compiler that

comes with ncurses::



    tic -s -x mtm.ti



or simply::



    make install-terminfo



This will install the following terminal types:



mtm

    This terminal type supports all of the features of mtm, but with

    the default 8 "ANSI" colors only.



mtm-256color

    Note that mtm is not magic and cannot actually display more colors

    than the host terminal supports.



mtm-noutf

    This terminal type supports everything the mtm terminal type does,

    but does not advertise UTF8 capability.



That command will compile and install the terminfo entry.  After doing so,

calling mtm with `-t mtm`::



    mtm -t mtm



will instruct programs to use that terminfo entry.

You can, of course, replace `mtm` with any of the other above terminal

types.



Using these terminfo entries allows programs to use the full power of mtm's

terminal emulation, but it is entirely optional. A primary design goal

of mtm was for it to be completely usable on systems that didn't have the

mtm terminfo entry installed. By default, mtm advertises itself as the

widely-available `screen-bce` terminal type.



Copyright and License

=====================



Copyright 2016-2019 Rob King 



This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify

it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by

the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or

(at your option) any later version.



This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,

but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of

MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the

GNU General Public License for more details.



You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License

along with this program.  If not, see .