Why use a terminal?

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FreeBSD has gotten me used to switching between consoles, and I like that environment. Why then use a terminal? Is there a downside?
 
Sometimes you don't have access to the console. Simply because the server is 100 miles away or it's locked inside a closet.
 
Well, I can control all my computers using SSH from the console - no need to open a terminal. What difference does 100 miles make?
 
I think it's way easier just to fire up a terminal to run some basic commands like ls, cp, rm, mv, etc. What I meant was I wouldn't wanna switch to another console just to ls.

I normally switch to a different console when I need to run something that will take a long period of time to complete(say building OpenOffice), because it happened to me a couple of times that my X crashed and it killed some foreground processes that I executed on my terminals.

Plus I prefer everything to be on the same screen. Even if I were to run something on a different console, sometimes I'd open up a terminal to watch the tty.

Hope I got the question right.
 
sixtydoses said:
I think it's way easier just to fire up a terminal to run some basic commands like ls, cp, rm, mv, etc. What I meant was I wouldn't wanna switch to another console just to ls.

I normally switch to a different console when I need to run something that will take a long period of time to complete(say building OpenOffice), because it happened to me a couple of times that my X crashed and it killed some foreground processes that I executed on my terminals.

Plus I prefer everything to be on the same screen. Even if I were to run something on a different console, sometimes I'd open up a terminal to watch the tty.

Hope I got the question right.
Click to expand...

you should get familiar with
sysutils/tmux
or sysutils/screen
 
@sixtydoses: Yes, you got the question exactly right. :) And those are good ideas. Thanks.

crsd: What do you mean by "terminal" then?
Click to expand...
I realize there is a bit of confusion these days, but I mean "terminal" as in Xterminal and it's ilke. By console I mean the Ctl-Alt-Fx sequence of consoles.

I'm putting FreeBSD together bit by bit so as to learn, and haven't developed a taste for the GUI yet. I did install Fluxbox (which is very nice) but I haven't found much use for it yet, except to open a GUI browser. That's why I'm asking questions about how other people like to work.

@killasmurf86: Interesting links.
 
OJ said:
@sixtydoses: Yes, you got the question exactly right. :) And those are good ideas. Thanks.

I realize there is a bit of confusion these days, but I mean "terminal" as in Xterminal and it's ilke. By console I mean the Ctl-Alt-Fx sequence of consoles.
Click to expand...

I see. One of the reasons for me- unicode (UTF-8) support.

I'm putting FreeBSD together bit by bit so as to learn, and haven't developed a taste for the GUI yet. I did install Fluxbox (which is very nice) but I haven't found much use for it yet, except to open a GUI browser. That's why I'm asking questions about how other people like to work.

@killasmurf86: Interesting links.
Click to expand...
 
Yep, UTF-8 is a good reason to use the terminals. Scrollback is also a nice feature that can save a bit of effort.
 
killasmurf86 said:
In console [real console] you can use scroll-lock and then navigate with arrow keys and pg-up/down....
Click to expand...

That works! killasmurf86, you're brilliant!
Now I don't have to redirect to a file and then use less, as I was doing before.
 
You can scroll in both tty as killasmurf86 mentioned as well as most (all?) terminal emulators using shift+page up/down for some such as xterm, or shift+arrows for others, or your mouse wheel.

You may also be interested in jobs, ^Z (ctrl+Z), bg and fg (see your shell's man page).
 
OJ said:
That works! killasmurf86, you're brilliant!
Now I don't have to redirect to a file and then use less, as I was doing before.
Click to expand...

you don't need to pipe to a file and then use less, you can use less directly in the pipeline:

Code: 
ps aux | less
 
If you use tmux or screen, you also get a scrollback buffer.

In tmux, the default keybinding is Ctrl+B,= after which you can use the cursors to move up/down. Esc will leave the scroll mode.
 
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