2 .\" vidcontrol - a utility for manipulating the syscons video driver
4 .\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
5 .\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
7 .\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
8 .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
9 .\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
10 .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
11 .\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
21 .Nd a utility for manipulating the syscons console driver.
25 .Op Fl c Ar appearance
27 .Op Fl f Ar size Ar file
29 .Op Fl i Cm adapter | mode
30 .Op Fl l Ar screen_map
34 .Op Fl r Ar foreground Ar background
36 .Op Fl t Ar N | Cm off
39 .Op Ar foreground Op Ar background
44 command is used to set various options for the
47 such as video mode, colors, cursor shape, screen output map, font and screen
50 The following command line options are supported:
51 .Bl -tag -width indent
53 Select a new video mode.
54 The modes currently recognized are:
88 .Sx Video Mode Support
90 .It Ar foreground Op Ar background
91 Change colors when displaying text.
92 Specify the foreground color
94 .Dq vidcontrol white ) ,
95 or both a foreground and background colors
97 .Dq vidcontrol yellow blue ) .
100 command below to see available colors.
102 See the supported colors on a given platform.
103 .It Fl r Ar foreground background
104 Change reverse mode colors to
111 This option may not be always supported by the video driver.
112 .It Fl c Cm normal | blink | destructive
113 Change the cursor appearance.
114 The cursor is either an inverting block
118 Or it can be like the old hardware cursor
120 The latter is actually a simulation.
122 Print out current output screen map.
123 .It Fl l Ar screen_map
124 Install screen output map file from
129 Install default screen output map.
131 Shows info about the current video adapter.
133 Shows the possible video modes with the current video hardware.
135 Sets the base character used to render the mouse pointer to
138 Switch the mouse pointer
142 Used together with the
144 daemon for text mode cut & paste functionality.
145 .It Fl f Ar size Ar file
155 The font file can be either uuencoded or in raw binary format.
156 You can also use the menu-driven
158 command to load the font of your choice.
160 Note that older video cards, such as MDA and CGA, do not support
163 .Sx Video Mode Support
166 below and the man page for
171 of the text mode for the modes with selectable
172 geometry. Currently only raster modes, such as
176 .Sx Video Mode Support
181 Set the current vty to
183 .It Fl t Ar N | Cm off
184 Set the screensaver timeout to
189 Use hexadecimal digits for output.
191 .Ss Video Mode Support
192 Note that not all modes listed above may be supported by the video
194 You can verify which mode is supported by the video hardware, using the
198 The VESA BIOS support must be linked to the kernel
199 or loaded as a KLD module if you wish to use VESA video modes
203 You need to compile your kernel with the
205 option if you wish to use VGA 90 column modes
208 Video modes other than 25 and 30 line modes may require specific size of font.
211 option above to load a font file to the kernel.
212 If the required size of font has not been loaded to the kernel,
214 will fail if the user attempts to set a new video mode.
216 .Bl -column "25 line modes" "8x16 (VGA), 8x14 (EGA)" -compact
217 .Sy Modes Ta Sy Font size
218 .Li 25 line modes Ta 8x16 (VGA), 8x14 (EGA)
219 .Li 30 line modes Ta 8x16
220 .Li 43 line modes Ta 8x8
221 .Li 50 line modes Ta 8x8
222 .Li 60 line modes Ta 8x8
225 It is better to always load all three sizes (8x8, 8x14 and 8x16)
228 You may set variables in
231 .Pa /etc/rc.conf.local
232 so that desired font files will be automatically loaded
233 when the system starts up.
236 If you want to use the raster text mode
238 you need to recomile your kernel with the
242 for more details on this kernel option.
243 .Sh VIDEO OUTPUT CONFIGURATION
244 .Ss Boot Time Configuration
245 You may set the following variables in
248 .Pa /etc/rc.conf.local
249 in order to configure the video output at boot time.
251 .Bl -tag -width foo_bar_var -compact
253 Sets the timeout value for the
256 .It Ar font8x16 , font8x14 , font8x8
257 Specifies font files for the
261 Specifies a screen output map file for the
269 .Ss Driver Configuration
270 The video card driver may let you change default configuration
271 options, such as the default font, so that you do not need to set up
272 the options at boot time.
273 See video card driver manuals,
277 .Bl -tag -width /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps/foo-bar -compact
278 .It Pa /usr/share/syscons/fonts/*
280 .It Pa /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps/*
281 screen output map files.
285 .Pa /usr/share/syscons/fonts/iso-8x16.fnt
290 .Dl vidcontrol -f 8x16 /usr/share/syscons/fonts/iso-8x16.fnt
292 So long as the font file is in
293 .Pa /usr/share/syscons/fonts ,
294 you may abbreviate the file name as
297 .Dl vidcontrol -f 8x16 iso-8x16
299 Likewise, you can also abbreviate the screen output map file name for
302 option if the file is found in
303 .Pa /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps .
305 .Dl vidcontrol -l iso-8859-1_to_cp437
307 The above command will load
308 .Pa /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps/iso-8859-1_to_cp437.scm .
310 The following command will set-up a 100x37 raster text mode (useful for
313 .Dl vidcontrol -g 100x37 VESA_800x600
325 .An S\(/oren Schmidt Aq sos@FreeBSD.org