Wiki

This page is read only. You can view the source, but not change it. Ask your administrator if you think this is wrong.
====== Ubuntu - Term - Access other user's screen session ======

An admin might want to check what another user is running using screen.  The best you can see even as root using ps, is just the name of the command, like below:

<code bash>
sudo ps awxuf | grep -i screen

root      1135  0.0  0.0  13636   976 pts/1    S+   13:27   0:00                          \_ grep --color=auto -i screen
john   4245  0.0  0.0 387364 16668 ?        Sl   Feb02   0:06  |       \_ gnome-screensaver
1001      6762  0.0  0.0 347384 10428 ?        Sl   Feb02   0:00              \_ gnome-screensaver
john    625  0.0  0.0  31320  1568 ?        Ss   11:57   0:00 SCREEN -S test
</code>

----

<code bash>
pstree -Gap 625

screen,625 -S test

  └─bash,626
</code>


When you try to access the screen session using other user, this is usually the error:

<code bash>
sudo -u john screen -r 625

Cannot open your terminal '/dev/pts/1' - please check.
</code>

This is because, your terminal: /dev/pts/1 is only readable and writable to the owner of the terminal:


<code bash>
ls -lh /dev/pts/1

crw--w---- 1 john tty 136, 1 Feb  12 13:30 /dev/pts/1
</code>

To overcome this, simply allow read and write to the terminal, to all users:

<WRAP important>
This needs to be run from the user who's screen you want to read.
</WRAP>

<code bash>
chmod o+rw /dev/pts/1
ls -lh /dev/pts/1

crw--w-rw- 1 john tty 136, 1 Feb  12 13:32 /dev/pts/1
</code>

Once that done, you can use sudo to access the screen of the other user:

<code bash>
sudo -u john screen -r 625
</code>