Scrolling with Shift + Page Up in Bash

Ragsdale45 · 07-14-2005, 03:45 PM

When I scroll with Shift + Page Up in Bash, it doesn't go up as far as I need it to. How can I increase the amount of lines it will scroll up to?

I'm not sure of the terminology to use. When Googling, I only found the recurring advice of "use Shift + Page Up/Down to scroll." Unfortunately when you don't know the terminology, search engines aren't very useful.

Matir · 07-14-2005, 04:07 PM

Are you using ssh? An xterm/gnome-terminal/etc? A local console on the machine?

Ragsdale45 · 07-14-2005, 04:13 PM

A local console on the machine I suppose. It's a bare bones Debian install with all text and no graphics of any sort.

Matir · 07-14-2005, 04:23 PM

I can't seem to find a way to configure the console scrollback buffer (though, if you want to google as well, those are some nice words to use). However, if you're dumping a single file or output from a program, you can use a pager like 'less' or 'more' to help you handle the output.

Ragsdale45 · 07-14-2005, 04:26 PM

Well let me be more specific. When I type ls -l /usr/bin I'll get a very long list. With plain old ls, however, I can see everything in there. How would you handle that situation?

Googling away.

Matir · 07-14-2005, 04:32 PM

I would do "ls -l /usr/bin | more" or "ls -l /usr/bin | less". Note that the character between /usr/bin and more or less is a pipe, not an l.

Ragsdale45 · 07-14-2005, 04:35 PM

That works well, thank you.

This page has some more info too: http://www.geocities.com/cyberkabila/faq/linuxfaq6.htm

Quote:

You can't increase the amount of scrollback, because it is implemented using the video memory to store the scrollback text.

Matir · 07-14-2005, 04:45 PM

I like it when I can learn something from a thread I respond to. Thank you.