2015-07-01

new "top" utility's "up-up down-down..." sequence

If you don't understand the title, this note isn't for you.

If you use Linux and are nauseated by the defaults of the "entirely new and enhanced replacement" of a really great utility on Linux, these steps are for you, thanks to the ArchLinux BBS:

rm ~/.toprc
top
Inside the top program, press: zV1ymmtttWq

From then on you may invoke top and see the screen you expected before the ghastly upgrade, that should probably have been called top-ng. I decline to say more so as not to start another flame war.

1 comment:

Arthur said...

Clearly, someone thought the new top was an improvement. If you want to give it a chance, you can do so, alongside having the comfortable old form available.

1. Find the 'top' utility ('which' helps), perhaps at '/usr/bin/top'.

2. Assuming you found top in that sample path, change the current directory to one that is on your executable path, and as a user with the appropriate privilege, execute the following command there:

ln -s /usr/bin/top top-ng

Now you can run top and see it the new way.

Oh, and by the way, don't bother looking at the '~/.toprc' file that the key sequence generates. Somebody forgot that an RC file was supposed to be human readable. Time to read esr's "The Art of Unix Programming" again, people.