query current window title to stdout?

[Michael Parson]

I've got a user that wants to be able to, with a single command,  
rename the title for the current window when he edits a file to the  
name of the file he is editing.

What I've come up with is a bash function:

svim () {
        echo -ne "\ekediting $1 \e\\"
        /usr/local/bin/vim $1
        echo -ne "\ekbash\e\\"
}

What I would like to be able to do, is query the title of the window  
before we rename it, so we can set it back to what it was after the  
editor quits.  something like:

oldname=`screen -X windowname`

So I could change that last echo to be more like

echo -ne "\ek$oldname\e\\"

However, it seems that just about every screen command only spit  
output to the status bar, hardline, or a new screen, except 'screen -l'.

Can this be done? or is the solution I've come up with going to be  
about as good as it gets?

--
Michael Parson
address@hidden