How do I Capture a Unix Terminal Session?

One of the best methods to capture a Unix terminal session is to use the `script` command.


In this example we start a script session, run a couple of commands, and then use the `exit` command to stop capturing the terminal session:

$ script
Script started, output file is typescript
$ pwd
/home/will
$ ps
PID TT STAT TIME COMMAND
11909 p0 Ss 0:00.05 -bash (bash)
25622 p0 S+ 0:00.01 script
25623 p1 Ss 0:00.01 /usr/local/bin/bash -i
25624 p1 R+ 0:00.00 ps
$ exit

Script done, output file is typescript
We have now captured our terminal session into the file "typescript".

We can use the `cat` command to view the contents of the "typescript" file:

$ cat typescript
Script started on Tue Jul 26 21:28:50 2005
$ pwd
/home/will
$ ps
PID TT STAT TIME COMMAND
11909 p0 Ss 0:00.05 -bash (bash)
25622 p0 S+ 0:00.01 script
25623 p1 Ss 0:00.01 /usr/local/bin/bash -i
25624 p1 R+ 0:00.00 ps
$ exit

Script done on Tue Jul 26 21:29:13 2005