GNU screen keeps changing window title on start & exit of vim

Question

My status line in screen is:

hardstatus alwayslastline "%{= Wk}%-Lw%50>%{= BW}%n%f* %t%{= Wk}%+Lw%<"

This always shows a list of windows with their names. I have also bound C-a T to set this back, in case there is some binary output to stdout and it changes.

However, since the last update to some package, it keeps changing whenever I open vim to

[No Name] - VIM

Then, whenever I close vim, I get

 - Terminal - Terminal - Terminal - Terminal

It starts with just one " - Terminal", but each time, there is one more. Screen also propagates this to the xterm window title of the terminal emulator.

So, whenever I open or close vim (and probably some other programs as well), I have to press C-a T. This is getting annoying.

How can I turn this off?

GNU bash, version 4.4.19(1)-release (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
Screen version 4.06.02 (GNU) 23-Oct-17
VIM - Vi IMproved 8.0 (2016 Sep 12, compiled Jun 07 2019 11:40:34)

Answer 1

I figured out that what I actually wanted was a caption, not a hardstatus:

caption [ top | bottom ] always|splitonly [string]

caption string [string]

This command controls the display of the window captions.  Normally a caption is only used if more than one window is shown on the display (split screen mode).  But if the type is set to always, screen shows a caption even if only one window is displayed.  The default is splitonly.

The second form changes the text used for the caption.  You can use all escapes from the "STRING ESCAPES" chapter.  Screen uses a default of ‘%3n %t’.

You can mix both forms by providing a string as an additional argument.

You can have the caption displayed either at the top or bottom of the window.  The default is bottom.

     – Source: (screen(1) man page.  See also: (GNU) Screen User’s Manual.

So, I set hardstatus to alwaysignore and added:

caption bottom always
caption always "%{= Wk}%-Lw%50>%{= BW}%n%f* %t%{= Wk}%+Lw%<"

The problem with "- Terminal" appearing multiple times in the status was caused by the terminal emulator (xfce4-terminal).