pager program like less, able to repeat top N lines

Question

Is there any way to make less program repeat first line (or first 2 lines) on every displayed page?

Is there any other pager program which can do this?

This would be a killer-app for database table browsing, think mysql or psql or gqlplus...

For those of you who don't get the idea, see the screenshot in the bottom of this page. I want to repeat header line + horizontal ascii bar.

Answer 1

Thanks for all the answers, but finally I found a solution using Vim -> http://filip.rembialkowski.net/vim-as-a-pager-for-psql/. Comments welcome!

Answer 2

Have you tried SQL Mode in Emacs/XEmacs?

It's certainly not as simple to use as more or less, but it does what your asking for, leaving a header row while scrolling results vertically and horizontally.

Answer 3

You could use multiple 'regions' in screen:

$ cat screenrc.sql
escape ^aa  # adjust as needed
bind q quit # to quickly exit
screen 0 less ${FILE}
screen 1 less ${FILE}
split  # create two regions
focus top # starting with the top region
resize 4  # make it four lines (one for screen line, one for less prompt)
select 0  # display window 0
focus bottom  # in the bottom region
select 1  # display window 1 and focus here

Then you just need to set the $FILE environment variable:

$ FILE=$HOME/.bash_profile screen -mc screenrc.sql

Answer 4

You can add a number before the 'forward' and it will scroll N lines, not a full length. So if your terminal window is 40 lines, type 38f to start scrolling only 38 lines, leaving the last 2 line from the last 'page.' From the manpage:

   SPACE or ^V or f or ^F
          Scroll forward N  lines,  default  one  window  (see  option  -z
          below).   If  N  is  more  than  the screen size, only the final
          screenful is displayed.  Warning: some systems use ^V as a  spe‐
          cial literalization character.

   z      Like  SPACE,  but  if  N is specified, it becomes the new window
          size.

   b or ^B or ESC-v
          Scroll backward N lines,  default  one  window  (see  option  -z
          below).   If  N  is  more  than  the screen size, only the final
          screenful is displayed.