xref: /freebsd/usr.sbin/vidcontrol/vidcontrol.1 (revision 7f9d26bd9d1b2754da8429257edbde0a8237f84f)
1.\" t
2.\"
3.\" vidcontrol - a utility for manipulating the syscons video driver
4.\"
5.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
6.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
7.\" are met:
8.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
9.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
10.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
11.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
12.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
13.\"
14.\"     @(#)vidcontrol.1
15.\" $FreeBSD$
16.\"
17.Dd June 30, 1999
18.Dt VIDCONTROL 1
19.Os
20.Sh NAME
21.Nm vidcontrol
22.Nd a utility for manipulating the syscons console driver.
23.Sh SYNOPSIS
24.Nm
25.Op Fl b Ar color
26.Op Fl c Ar appearance
27.Op Fl d
28.Op Fl f Ar size Ar file
29.Op Fl i Cm adapter | mode
30.Op Fl l Ar screen_map
31.Op Fl L
32.Op Fl m Cm on | off
33.Op Fl r Ar foreground Ar background
34.Op Fl s Ar number
35.Op Fl t Ar N | Cm off
36.Op Fl x
37.Op Ar mode
38.Op Ar foreground Op Ar background
39.Op Cm show
40.Sh DESCRIPTION
41The
42.Nm
43command is used to set various options for the
44.Xr syscons 4
45console driver,
46such as video mode, colors, cursor shape, screen output map, font and screen
47saver timeout.
48.Pp
49The following command line options are supported:
50.Bl -tag -width indent
51.It Ar mode
52Select a new video mode. The modes currently recognized are:
53.Ar 80x25 ,
54.Ar 80x30 ,
55.Ar 80x43 ,
56.Ar 80x50 ,
57.Ar 80x60 ,
58.Ar 132x25 ,
59.Ar 132x30 ,
60.Ar 132x43 ,
61.Ar 132x50 ,
62.Ar 132x60 ,
63.Ar VGA_40x25 ,
64.Ar VGA_80x25 ,
65.Ar VGA_80x30 ,
66.Ar VGA_80x50 ,
67.Ar VGA_80x60 ,
68.Ar EGA_80x25 ,
69.Ar EGA_80x43 ,
70.Ar VESA_132x25 ,
71.Ar VESA_132x43 ,
72.Ar VESA_132x50 ,
73.Ar VESA_132x60 .
74.\"The graphic mode
75.\".Ar VGA_320x200
76.\"and
77The raster text mode
78.Ar VESA_800x600
79can also be chosen.
80See
81.Sx Video Mode Support
82below.
83.It Ar foreground Op Ar background
84Change colors when displaying text. Specify the foreground color
85(e.g.
86.Dq vidcontrol white ) ,
87or both a foreground and background colors
88(e.g.
89.Dq vidcontrol yellow blue ) .
90Use the
91.Cm show
92command below to see available colors.
93.It Cm show
94See the supported colors on a given platform.
95.It Fl r Ar foreground background
96Change reverse mode colors to
97.Ar foreground
98and
99.Ar background .
100.It Fl b Ar color
101Set border color to
102.Ar color .
103This option may not be always supported by the video driver.
104.It Fl c Cm normal | blink | destructive
105Change the cursor appearance. The cursor is either an inverting block
106.Pq Cm normal
107that eventually can
108.Cm blink .
109Or it can be like the old hardware cursor
110.Pq Cm destructive .
111The latter is actually a simulation.
112.It Fl d
113Print out current output screen map.
114.It Fl l Ar screen_map
115Install screen output map file from
116.Ar screen_map .
117See also
118.Xr syscons 4 .
119.It Fl L
120Install default screen output map.
121.It Fl i Cm adapter
122Shows info about the current video adapter.
123.It Fl i Cm mode
124Shows the possible video modes with the current video hardware.
125.It Fl m Cm on | off
126Switch the mouse pointer
127.Cm on
128or
129.Cm off .
130Used together with the
131.Xr moused 8
132daemon for text mode cut & paste functionality.
133.It Fl f Ar size Ar file
134Load font
135.Ar file
136for
137.Ar size
138(currently, only
139.Cm 8x8 ,
140.Cm 8x14
141or
142.Cm 8x16 ) .
143The font file can be either uuencoded or in raw binary format.
144You can also use the menu-driven
145.Xr vidfont 1
146command to load the font of your choice.
147.Pp
148Note that older video cards, such as MDA and CGA, do not support
149software font.
150See also
151.Sx Video Mode Support
152and
153.Sx EXAMPLE
154below and the man page for
155.Xr syscons 4 .
156.It Fl s Ar number
157Set the current vty to
158.Ar number .
159.It Fl t Ar N | Cm off
160Set the screensaver timeout to
161.Ar N
162seconds, or turns it
163.Cm off .
164.It Fl x
165Use hexadecimal digits for output.
166.El
167.Ss Video Mode Support
168Note that not all modes listed above may be supported by the video
169hardware.
170You can verify which mode is supported by the video hardware, using the
171.Fl i Cm mode
172option.
173.Pp
174The VESA BIOS support must be linked to the kernel
175or loaded as a KLD module if you wish to use VESA video modes
176or 132 column modes
177.Pq see Xr vga 4 .
178.Pp
179Video modes other than 25 and 30 line modes may require specific size of font.
180Use
181.Fl f
182option above to load a font file to the kernel.
183If the required size of font has not been loaded to the kernel,
184.Nm
185will fail if the user attempts to set a new video mode.
186.Pp
187.TS
188c s
189c c
190l c.
191Video modes and font size
192Modes	Font size
19325 line modes	8x16 (VGA), 8x14 (EGA)
19430 line modes	8x16
19543 line modes	8x8
19650 line modes	8x8
19760 line modes	8x8
198.TE
199.Pp
200It is better to always load all three sizes (8x8, 8x14 and 8x16)
201of the same font.
202.Pp
203You may set variables in
204.Pa /etc/rc.conf
205or
206.Pa /etc/rc.conf.local
207so that desired font files will be automatically loaded
208when the system starts up.
209See below.
210.Pp
211If you want to use the raster text mode
212.Ar VESA_800x600 ,
213you need to recomile your kernel with the
214.Em SC_PIXEL_MODE
215option.  See
216.Xr syscons 4
217for more details on this kernel option.
218.Sh VIDEO OUTPUT CONFIGURATION
219.Ss Boot Time Configuration
220You may set the following variables in
221.Pa /etc/rc.conf
222or
223.Pa /etc/rc.conf.local
224in order to configure the video output at boot time.
225.Pp
226.Bl -tag -width foo_bar_var -compact
227.It Ar blanktime
228Sets the timeout value for the
229.Fl t
230option.
231.It Ar font8x16 , font8x14 , font8x8
232Specifies font files for the
233.Fl f
234option.
235.It Ar scrnmap
236Specifies a screen output map file for the
237.Fl l
238option.
239.El
240.Pp
241See
242.Xr rc.conf 5
243for more details.
244.Ss Driver Configuration
245The video card driver may let you change default configuration
246options, such as the default font, so that you do not need to set up
247the options at boot time.
248See video card driver manuals,
249.Pq e.g. Xr vga 4
250for details.
251.Sh FILES
252.Bl -tag -width /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps/foo-bar -compact
253.It Pa /usr/share/syscons/fonts/*
254font files.
255.It Pa /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps/*
256screen output map files.
257.El
258.Sh EXAMPLE
259If you want to load
260.Pa /usr/share/syscons/fonts/iso-8x16.fnt
261to the kernel, run
262.Nm
263as:
264.Pp
265.Dl vidcontrol -f 8x16 /usr/share/syscons/fonts/iso-8x16.fnt
266.Pp
267So long as the font file is in
268.Pa /usr/share/syscons/fonts ,
269you may abbreviate the file name as
270.Pa iso-8x16 :
271.Pp
272.Dl vidcontrol -f 8x16 iso-8x16
273.Pp
274Likewise, you can also abbreviate the screen output map file name for
275the
276.Fl l
277option if the file is found in
278.Pa /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps .
279.Pp
280.Dl vidcontrol -l iso-8859-1_to_cp437
281.Pp
282The above command will load
283.Pa /usr/share/syscons/scrnmaps/iso-8859-1_to_cp437.scm .
284.Sh SEE ALSO
285.Xr kbdcontrol 1 ,
286.Xr vidfont 1 ,
287.Xr keyboard 4 ,
288.Xr screen 4 ,
289.Xr syscons 4 ,
290.Xr vga 4 ,
291.Xr rc.conf 5 ,
292.Xr kldload 8 ,
293.Xr moused 8
294.Sh AUTHORS
295.An S�ren Schmidt Aq sos@FreeBSD.org
296