Alternate screen in xfce4 terminal, can I turn it off?

[Chris Green]

On Sun, Mar 31, 2013 at 11:29:46AM -0400, Greg Folkert wrote:
> On Sun, 2013-03-31 at 16:18 +0100, Chris Green wrote:
> > Is it possible to turn off the 'alternate screen' in xfce4 terminal?
> 
> Which 'alternate screen' are you talking about... a few more words
> explaining what you mean or a picture would help.
> 
> I don't understand what you are asking.

Sorry, I suppose it is quite 'old fashioned'.  It's the xterm alternate
screen which most terminal emulators provide because they emulate an
xterm.  

The classic use is by vi and vi clones which switch to the alternate
screen on loading and switch back on exit so the editor text isn't
visible when you leave the editor.

It's essentially an alternate screen buffer which you can switch to and
from.  I want to turn it off so that vi's text won't become invisible
when I execute shell commands from vi.


-- 
Chris Green