Zellij Session Manager — Every Terminal, Named, Resumable, Remote

The Problem

Two laptops, two cities, terminal chaos. Sessions unnamed, untracked, and gone after reboot.

Cities

2

Bengaluru ↔ Guwahati

Sessions

??

Unnamed, untracked

After reboot

0

Everything gone

What was happening

1

Open terminal, cd ~/git/kri, start working

2

Open another terminal, cd ~/git/atlas, start working

3

Laptop restarts — both terminals gone, no idea what was running

4

SSH from Guwahati — can’t reach any sessions, start over

The core issue: Terminal sessions are anonymous, ephemeral, and local. No naming, no persistence, no remote access.

Why Zellij (not tmux)

Zellij gives us session resurrection without plugins, discoverable keybindings without memorization, and floating panes without configuration.

Zellij wins

Session restore	Built-in, no plugins
Discoverability	Live keybinding hints
Floating panes	Built-in (Alt-p)
Layout files	KDL (human-readable)
Config to be productive	Zero lines needed

tmux wins

Pre-installed	Every server
Plugin ecosystem	Mature (TPM)
Scripting	Shell-scriptable
Community	15+ years of guides
Memory	~4MB vs ~22MB

The decision: Zellij for local dev (better UX, built-in resurrection). tmux stays on remote servers (pre-installed everywhere). The shell hook + Tailscale bridge the gap.

Architecture

4 scripts + 1 config + 1 shell hook = every terminal tracked, named, and resumable.

zj

capture

Existing terminal → Zellij session

sess

fzf

Pick from all sessions

shell hook

auto

New terminal → auto-create session

Complete architecture — animated LIVE

Session Lifecycle

From opening a terminal to resuming after reboot — every state transition.

State machine — animated transitions

Reboot Recovery

How sessions survive a laptop restart.

The chain

1

Zellij saves to disk — every pane layout, tab, scrollback → ~/.local/share/zellij/

2

Laptop reboots — all processes die, disk persists

3

Tailscale auto-connects — stable IP 198.51.100.27 returns

4

Open terminal — shell hook runs, finds saved session

5

Zellij restores — layout + scrollback back, empty shells in right positions

Important: Zellij restores the layout (panes, tabs, positions) and scrollback. It does not restore running processes. A python server.py that was running will need to be re-started. This is true for every multiplexer — no tool survives a reboot and brings back live processes.

config.kdl

Zellij configuration — mode-based keybindings, dark theme, sensible defaults.

Key design choices

Setting	Value	Why
default_shell	bash	Consistent across terminals
scroll_buffer_size	50000	Deep scrollback for logs
pane_frames	false	Clean look, less visual noise
mirror_session	true	New panes open in current dir
theme	custom dark	Matches blog design

Keybinding summary

Binding	Action	Mode
Alt-d / Alt-r	New pane (down / right)	Pane
Alt-hjkl	Move between panes	Pane
Alt-f	Toggle fullscreen pane	Pane
Alt-p	Floating pane	Global
Alt-t	New tab	Tab
Alt-1..5	Switch to tab N	Tab
Alt-s	Detach	Session
Ctrl-p	Enter pane mode (see all keys)	Global
Ctrl-t	Enter tab mode (see all keys)	Global

zj — Capture Existing Terminal

The missing piece: bring an already-running terminal into Zellij.

Usage

# In any terminal — capture this shell into a Zellij session
$ zj
Creating session: kri

# Capture with explicit name
$ zj my-project
Creating session: my-project

# List all sessions
$ zj -l
kri   3 panes
atlas 5 panes

# Kill a session
$ zj -k old-project

# Attach from outside Zellij
$ zj -a kri

What “capture” means

zj creates a new Zellij session with the same $PWD. Your current shell continues until you type exit. On the next new terminal, the shell hook auto-attaches to this session.

Inside Zellij already? zj creates a new tab instead of a new session. This is how you expand your workspace without leaving Zellij.

sess — Fuzzy Session Picker

Type sess and fzf shows all Zellij sessions. Type to filter, enter to attach.

sess flow — animated

zj-migrate — Capture All Existing Terminals

One command to scan every running terminal and offer to create Zellij sessions for them.

How it works

$ zj-migrate
Scanning running terminals...

Found 3 terminal(s) to capture:

  DIRECTORY                              SESSION NAME
  ────────────────────────────────────── ────────────
  /home/dk/Documents/git/kri             kri          (new)
  /home/dk/Documents/git/atlas           atlas        (new)
  /home/dk/Documents/git/blog-drafts     blog-drafts  (new)

Create Zellij sessions for these? [y/N] y

  CREATE  kri → /home/dk/Documents/git/kri
  CREATE  atlas → /home/dk/Documents/git/atlas
  CREATE  blog-drafts → /home/dk/Documents/git/blog-drafts

Done! 3 session(s) created.

List sessions:  zellij list-sessions
Attach:         zellij attach <session>
Fuzzy picker:   sess

What it scans: All bash/zsh/fish processes, all terminal emulator processes (gnome-terminal, kitty, alacritty, wezterm). Derives session names from their current working directories. Skips duplicates and Zellij-managed panes.

Shell Hook

The magic: every new terminal auto-creates/attaches to a Zellij session named after the directory.

The hook

# ~/.config/zellij/sess.sh — add to ~/.bashrc
if [[ -z "$ZELLIJ" ]]; then
  [[ $- == *i* ]] || return
  local session=$(basename "$PWD" | tr '.' '-')
  [[ "$session" == "$(basename "$HOME")" ]] && session="main"
  command -v zellij &>/dev/null || return
  if zellij list-sessions 2>/dev/null | grep -q "^${session}:"; then
    exec zellij attach "$session"
  else
    exec zellij --session "$session"
  fi
fi

How it works: On every shell startup, check if we’re inside Zellij. If not, derive a session name from $PWD. If the session exists → attach. If not → create. The exec replaces the shell process so Zellij takes over cleanly.

Edge cases handled

Scenario	Behavior
In $HOME	Session named “main” (not “dk”)
Non-interactive shell	Skipped (scripts, cron)
Zellij not installed	Skipped gracefully
Already inside Zellij	Skipped (no nested Zellij)
Directory with dots	Dots → dashes (e.g. my.project → my-project)

Install

Everything you need, in order.

Quick install

# 1. Install Zellij (pre-built binary, fastest)
$ curl -sL https://github.com/zellij-org/zellij/releases/download/v0.44.3/zellij-x86_64-unknown-linux-musl.tar.gz | tar xz
$ mv zellij ~/.local/bin/

# 2. Create config
$ mkdir -p ~/.config/zellij
$ cat > ~/.config/zellij/config.kdl ooter

# 3. Add shell integration
$ echo 'source ~/.config/zellij/sess.sh' >> ~/.bashrc

# 4. Install scripts
$ cp zj zj-migrate sess ~/.local/bin/
$ chmod +x ~/.local/bin/{zj,zj-migrate,sess}

# 5. Restart shell
$ source ~/.bashrc

# 6. Capture existing terminals
$ zj-migrate

Prerequisites

Tool	Required	Install
Zellij	Yes	Binary above or cargo install zellij
fzf	For sess	apt install fzf
Tailscale	For remote	Already installed

Key Bindings

Shell

zj	Capture terminal → session
zj name	Capture with name
zj -l	List sessions
zj -k name	Kill session
zj -a name	Attach to session
sess	Fuzzy session picker
zj-migrate	Capture all terminals

Inside Zellij

Alt-d / Alt-r	New pane (down/right)
Alt-hjkl	Move between panes
Alt-f	Toggle fullscreen
Alt-p	Floating pane
Alt-t	New tab
Alt-1..5	Switch tab
Ctrl-p	Pane mode (all keys)
Ctrl-t	Tab mode (all keys)

Remote Access via Tailscale

From Guwahati, from any city, from any machine on your Tailscale network.

The flow

# From Guwahati (or anywhere on Tailscale)
$ ssh 198.51.100.27

# List all sessions
$ sess
# → fzf shows: ● kri  ○ atlas  ○ blog

# Or attach directly
$ zellij attach kri

# Everything is exactly where you left it
# Pane layouts, scrollback, tab names — all preserved

Tailscale advantage: Stable IP (198.51.100.27) that survives network changes. Auto-connects on boot. WireGuard encryption. No port forwarding, no DNS setup.

Cheat Sheet

Session Management
zj
zj name
zj -l
zj -k name
sess
zj-migrate
Inside Zellij (Alt-based, no prefix)
Alt-d / Alt-r
Alt-h / Alt-j / Alt-k / Alt-l
Alt-f
Alt-p
Alt-t
Alt-1..5
Alt-s
Alt-x
Alt-w
Ctrl-p
Ctrl-t
Ctrl-s