Selecting text in terminal without using the mouse

Question

If I'm working in a terminal window in Linux, is there a keyboard shortcut I can use to select output displayed on previous lines? If I select something with the mouse I can copy using Ctrl + Shift + C, but is there a way to select without using the mouse at all. I'm using either Gnome terminal or KDE konsole in Ubuntu desktop.

For example I often need to copy results from a mysql query and then google them.

You need to add more details. Are you at a "raw" virtual console, or running a console-emulator in e.g. GNOME or something? — unwind, Oct 08 '09 at 09:55
Exact duplicate: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/312213/how-do-i-copy-text-from-my-xterm-without-a-mouse — Nathan Fellman, Oct 08 '09 at 09:58

score 12 · Answer 1 · edited Aug 24 '18 at 11:31

12

You can use the screen application and enter copy mode with Ctrl+a, Esc. Start selecting text with Space and end selecting text with Space. Insert text with Ctrl+a, ]

edited Aug 24 '18 at 11:31

Carolus

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answered Oct 08 '09 at 09:55

knittl

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A better explanation how to use screen: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/312213/ – tomrozb Jul 18 '13 at 21:29

score 8 · Answer 2 · edited Aug 24 '18 at 11:42

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Daniel Micay's Termite sports a "selection mode". Pressing Ctrl+Shift+Space will activate it. It's got vim-like key bindings. v or V will select à la vim's visual mode, y will yank, Esc will exit selection mode.

edited Aug 24 '18 at 11:42

Carolus

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answered Apr 01 '15 at 08:44

Niko

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Does it allow search in visual mode? – logbasex Jul 03 '21 at 08:02
Applies to [alacritty](https://github.com/alacritty/alacritty/) as well. – user598527 Jun 26 '22 at 08:44

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 11 '11 at 13:38

Screen and Emacs M-x shell, for example, allow for keyboard access to the scrollback buffer. This was also one of the features of Plan 9 (but I guess it was mouse-oriented, at least primarily); you might want to take a look at 9term and/or Sam, the Plan 9 editor.

joao silva · Answer 4 · 2023-01-06T19:54:47.933

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You can to it at terminal:

1 - Move the cursor to the beginning of line using ctrl + a

 $ touch test.txt

2 - Copy the line to the paste area ctrl + k

3 - Finally, you can past it ctrl + y

$ touch test.txt

4- You can do it in a single word or more just using crtl + ← or crtl + → and use crtl + k at word's beginning.

edited Jan 06 '23 at 19:54

answered Jan 06 '23 at 19:46

joao silva

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Oooh, composition! I was quite sure I was missing something. Now I can use `ctrl-b` to move back too, and use many other emacs movement shortcuts! – dmvianna Mar 27 '23 at 02:09
This does not address the question, which is about selecting text so as to be able to copy to the system clipboard (enabling pasting in other applications). Instead, this response answers a different, unasked question, i.e. how to copy and paste using the GNU kill ring. – teraspora Mar 29 '23 at 19:45

score -1 · Answer 5 · edited Mar 22 '23 at 19:38

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If you want to copy the command(which you typed) without using mouse, you can try this ctrl + space + ← OR →.

Now you can select the words.

edited Mar 22 '23 at 19:38

Fedor

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answered Mar 16 '23 at 05:53

Piyush Darji

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Vitalij Chepelev · Answer 6 · 2021-12-25T13:17:38.237

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$ emacs -g '80x24' --eval '(term "/bin/bash")'

    C-c C-k    char mode
    C-c C-j    line mode
    C-space    Selecting text in terminal without using the mouse
    M-w        copy to X11 clipboard

C - Ctrl M - Alt

edited Dec 25 '21 at 13:17

answered Dec 25 '21 at 11:35

Vitalij Chepelev

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Selecting text in terminal without using the mouse

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