David Riley:
Personally, my favorite is juggling jobs with ^Z and 'fg %x', since it means one less thing to have to click on (also, I got my start in command-line programming on single-window terminals, so jobs juggling was the only option). If possible, I like to avoid mouse use entirely; it entails a high context-switch overhead.
I started with programmable calculators, but they were limited to their ROM system. Punched cards and greenbar on batch systems gave access to a world of languages but was S L O W and frustrationg, particularly the turnaround to fix just ONE syntax error, or 'desk debugging' an ABEND. Migrating to a Teletype was nicer: interactive but still limited by the printer mechanism. Migrating to a "glass tty" was a step up for full screen interactive editing, saving paper, no more waiting for the printer, etc. But this is where the narrative diverges. 1) Using a dedicated terminal is nice because there's little to go wrong with it once the baud rate and such are set. Any problem and just swap terminals. VCF celebrates such systems. A lot. 2) But once I started using Procomm under DOS, I could do a lot more. File transfers. Play back scripts. Save screen shots. Log the entire session. Automate dialers and logins. 3) I used Unix shell layers, job control and various data switches with a plain terminal. It allows multiplexing the single device. But it's still just one connection at a time. It's nice having the OPTION of multiple active windows. Right now, I'm using a laptop with a full screen vi-editor, composing this into a temporary file that I'll cut-and-paste into my gmail account to reply to the list. But with just one click, I'm back to the full screen Firefox since I am still reading the list digest. That's how I'm combining my replies. No need for refresh, oh where was I, etc. But then again, I just interrupted vi for a shell escape to blast out a quick email because this is via ssh to a remote system and it's a nusance to create a temporary window, ssh again just for one interruption.