How to configure PuTTY so that Home/End/PgUp/PgDn work properly in bash?

Question

The keys Home, End, PageUp, PageDown all type a ~ in my bash session instead of moving the cursor / view around. Why does this happen and which settings do I need to change?

GNU bash, version 4.0.28(1)-release (x86_64--netbsd)
PuTTY v0.60

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The question originally read:

In PuTTY, why does pressing the "Home" key on the shell (bash) type a "~"? Or rather, how do I make it move the cursor to the start of the command I've typed?

(I thought the reason was that ~ is the home directory, but the answers say this is not so.)

Answer 1

Change the Terminal-type String under the Connection > Data tab from the default “xterm” to “linux”. It worked for me.

Answer 2

This is happening because you don't have PuTTY's terminal type set correctly, or because your server doesn't have the correct terminfo definitions installed.

On Debian-based systems, the ncurses-term package (version 5.7+20081213-1) includes terminfo definition files for putty, putty-256color and putty-vt100 terminal types. If you have this package installed, you can set the "Terminal-type string" to "putty" instead of the default "xterm" in Putty's session configuration (Connection -> Data).

Stephen Irons also mentions "linux" as another terminal type that works; I believe this is correct from prior experience, but haven't tested it recently.

On my systems, this allows Home and End to work correctly, though PageUp/PageDown do not scroll the console window. (They do work properly in ncurses applications like aptitude, and Shift-PgUp/Shift-PgDn scroll the console window.)

Answer 3

If you want to verify which code is sent by PuTTY to your terminal when you press a key or a combination of keys, you just have to issue a Ctrl+V and then press on the desired key.

For example on my box, pressing the Home key will generate the following string on my terminal:

^[[1~

That means that PuTTY sends the escape character ^[ followed by the string [1~.

You can create an ~/.inputrc file in your $HOME folder, or alternatively an /etc/inputrc file depending on your system. Then fill this file with the PuTTY codes and the matching Bash actions you want to be triggered by Bash.

Note: Replace every ^[ character by the equivalent \e string

In my example, I'll add a line with my Home key code and the beginning-of-line action (which by default is bound to Ctrl+A in Bash):

"\e[1~": beginning-of-line

FYI, my inputrc file has the following content:

set meta-flag on
set input-meta on
set convert-meta off
set output-meta on
"\e[1~": beginning-of-line     # Home key
"\e[4~": end-of-line           # End key
"\e[5~": beginning-of-history  # PageUp key
"\e[6~": end-of-history        # PageDown key
"\e[3~": delete-char           # Delete key
"\e[2~": quoted-insert         # Insert key
"\eOD": backward-word          # Ctrl + Left Arrow key
"\eOC": forward-word           # Ctrl + Right Arrow key

From @Cimbali: More bindable commands (like previous-history: Move `up' through the history list) available on this reference page.

Answer 4

Crtl+A takes you to the start of the line

Here's a list of Bash keyboard shortcuts

Answer 5

What it's actually sending is ^[[1~ which is a terminal escape sequence consisting of:

• ^[ - escape
• [ - left square bracket
• 1 - one
• ~ - tilde

You can see that by pressing Ctrl+V then Home.

You might be able to fix your problem by changing the PuTTY keyboard setting for Home and End keys to rxvt (which makes the escape sequence ^[[H or by changing the $TERM you're using (or by editing ~/.inputrc).

By the way there's no relationship between the tilde you get when you press Home and the tilde that represents the home directory. For example, in my setup Page-Down produces ^[[6~ which would also print a tilde if it weren't being properly interpreted.

Answer 6

I couldn't get it working with other methods. I however created this AutoHotkey script that works, as long as your shell is Bash:

#IfWinActive ahk_class PuTTY
PgUp::Send +{PgUp}
PgDn::Send +{PgDn}
Home::Send ^a   ; beginning of line
End::Send ^e    ; end of line
+^Del::Send ^k  ; delete whole line after cursor
+End::Send ^k   ; delete whole line after cursor
+Home::Send ^u  ; delete whole line before cursor
^Del::Send !d   ; delete word after cursor
^BS::Send ^w    ; delete word before cursor
^Left::Send !b  ; jump word left
^Right::Send !f ; jump word right
#IfWinActive

Use with caution though, since not all of these bash hotkeys work in other programs.

Answer 7

Non of these options worked for me. I am running an old AIX system. I had to add the following alias's to my .profile

alias __A=$(print '\0020') # ^P = up = previous command
alias __B=$(print '\0016') # ^N = down = next command
alias __C=$(print '\0006') # ^F = right = forward a character
alias __D=$(print '\0002') # ^B = left = back a character