Use altscreen like vim with screen with Ubuntu XTerm

When I exit a screen, I want to be able to return to the terminal looking as I left it. But right now, all I can do is have it clear the screen and put the terminal at the top or the bottom through modifying my .screenrc file. I can get the interaction I want by doing tput smcup; screen -S hello; tput rmcup, but I don't think I can easily alias or safely make it into a function*.  How would I change my .screenrc file to get this behavior? Here is what I have tried to little effect from other Stack Exchange questions:

termcapinfo xterm|xterms|xs|rxvt ti@:te@
termcapinfo xterm*|rxvt*  te=\E?1049l:ti=\E[?1049h:
termcapinfo xterm*|rxvt*  te=:ti=

from [How to prevent GNU screen from clearing the screen when terminating? I also read the answer to “Why doesn't the screen clear when running vi?” in the XTerm FAQ by Thomas E. Dickey , but couldn't translate it into something actionable. Changing the term command didn't affect me and I didn't try the second part: Detaching from a GNU Screen suddenly clears the terminal (on Super User). \____________ \ \* I did actually try my hand at it, but I'd like some confirmation that this wouldn't break anything: jscreen () { if [ $# -eq 2 ]; then if [ $1 == "-r" ] || [ $1 == "-S" ]; then tput smcup screen $@ tput rmcup return fi fi screen $@ }