Learning ai for absolute beginners — How to Get Started with Tmux
We are following fast.ai Live coding forum page at https://forums.fast.ai/t/live-coding-aka-walk-thrus/96617
Today we are following forums.fast.ai Live Coding 2 which is the second video in the series. It is designed to help show people all the basics needed to start programming with ai. One year of programming is recommended.
During live coding video 2 you will start using Tmux. It is a terminal multiplexer and it lets you use multiple programs at once. An easy way to get a quick introduction to Tmux is just type man tmux or info tmux (both the same here) in your shell (the shell is the name of the program that runs in the terminal, some people just say terminal when referencing this).
Now you can also do a quick google search for tmux and you will find articles that list the complete tmux instructions (kind of like a walkthrough).
I would recommend just try and follow along with the live coding session by typing some of the commands as instructed in your shell. If you want to know a few of the basic commands that are used all the time they would be as follows: try tmux a to see if any tmux sessions are running. Then Ctrl + d (we just write this as C-d) to close the session (if you are running Jupiter lab you must type C-c first). Repeat for all open sessions.
Tmux basic instructions for starting new sessions:
1. Tmux to start new session
2. Ctrl + b (C-b) then press “ or % for a new pane (horizontal or vertical)
3. C-b arrow keys (to move around to different panes)
4. C-b C-o to rotate panes
5. C-b space or alt 1–5 to change views (alt 1–5 is listed as M1–5 in tmux help)
6. C-b z to zoom in or out (maximize or minimize a pane)
For now, we do not need to spend too much time on the Tmux, so just a quick skim of man or info and maybe practice a few of the basics. You do not want to spend too much time on this at the moment because your time would be better spent following along with the live coding video (you could spend days learning Tmux but at the moment we are not using all those features).
In the future you will want to do some more advanced stuff because Tmux is very powerful and fast for daily use. You can even change the key bindings, but that would not be good at the moment because we learn in the walkthrough video that leaving them with default settings allows all programs to work properly together, and if you start making lots of changes you will have problems with compatibility.
Why even use Tmux? It is powerful and allows you not only to do multiple things at once, but you can leave your session running while you are away.
Thanks for reading!
Mike Sam Hill
instagram.com/mikesamhill/
Twitter: @MikeHil79276101
github.com/MikeHill7
facebook.com/MikeSamHill/
mikesamhill.com (coming soon — maybe 😊 )
LinkedIn: mikesamhill
