1CONSOLE-SETUP(5)          Console-setup User's Manual         CONSOLE-SETUP(5)
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3
4

NAME

6       console-setup - configuration file for setupcon
7

DESCRIPTION

9       The  file  console-setup specifies the encoding and the font to be used
10       by setupcon(1) in order to setup the console.  It can be used  also  to
11       specify  the  keyboard  layout  but it is not recommended to do so, use
12       keyboard(5) instead.
13
14       The font specification consists of three  parameters  -  codeset,  font
15       face and font size.  The codeset specifies what characters will be sup‐
16       ported by the font.   There  isn't  one-to-one  correspondence  between
17       codeset  and  encoding,  for  example the codeset Lat15 is suitable for
18       ISO 8859-1, ISO 8859-9 and ISO 8859-15.  The codesets are two  kinds  -
19       small and big.  Only small codesets are supported on FreeBSD.
20
21       The  font face determines the general look of the font.  Each font face
22       is available in certain possible sizes.  On FreeBSD only 8x16, 8x14 and
23       8x8  are  valid  sizes.   On  Linux  if framebuffer is not used or con‐
24       solechars(1) is installed instead of  setfont(1),  then  the  permitted
25       sizes have the form 8xNUMBER.
26
27
28       The  console  driver  of FreeBSD permits fonts in different sizes to be
29       simultaneously loaded.  Which one of them will be actually used depends
30       on  the  current video mode.  Therefore, on this platform the font size
31       specification will be ignored and setupcon(1) will  load  the  selected
32       font face in all available sizes.
33
34       The file console-setup consists of variable settings in POSIX format:
35
36              VARIABLE='VALUE'
37
38       Only  one assignment is allowed per line.  Comments (starting with '#')
39       are also allowed.
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41

OPTIONS

43       The following variables can be set.
44
45
46       ACTIVE_CONSOLES
47              Specifies the device files in /dev of the virtual  terminals  to
48              be  configured.   File  name wild-cards (*, ?)  are allowed.  On
49              Linux usually you can set this to /dev/tty[1-6] and on FreeBSD a
50              sensible  value is /dev/ttyv[0-8].  You can assign to this vari‐
51              able also the special value guess.  It will cause setupcon(1) to
52              attempt  to guess the active virtual consoles by looking in con‐
53              figuration files  such  as  /etc/inittab  and  /etc/ttys.   This
54              guessing is not always reliable.
55
56
57       CHARMAP
58              Specifies  the  desired  encoding  on the console.  Valid values
59              are: UTF-8, ARMSCII-8, CP1251, CP1255, CP1256, GEORGIAN-ACADEMY,
60              GEORGIAN-PS,   IBM1133,   ISIRI-3342,   ISO-8859-1,  ISO-8859-2,
61              ISO-8859-3,  ISO-8859-4,  ISO-8859-5,  ISO-8859-6,   ISO-8859-7,
62              ISO-8859-8,  ISO-8859-9,  ISO-8859-10, ISO-8859-11, ISO-8859-13,
63              ISO-8859-14, ISO-8859-15, ISO-8859-16, KOI8-R,  KOI8-U,  TIS-620
64              and VISCII.  The special value guess is also recognized in which
65              case the system command locale(1) will be used to guess the  de‐
66              sired  encoding  (currently  this  works  reliably only with GNU
67              libc).
68
69
70       CODESET
71              In most cases the special value guess can be used here in  which
72              case a suitable codeset will be guessed.  The codeset determines
73              which symbols are supported by the font.  Valid  small  codesets
74              are:   Armenian,  CyrAsia,  CyrKoi,  CyrSlav,  Georgian,  Greek,
75              Hebrew, Lao, Lat15, Lat2, Lat38, Lat7 and Thai.  Valid big code‐
76              sets  are:  Arabic,  Ethiopian, Uni1, Uni2, Uni3 and Vietnamese.
77              Only small codesets can be used on FreeBSD.  See below the  sec‐
78              tion  entitled  “CODESETS”  for  detailed description of each of
79              these codesets.
80
81
82       FONTFACE and FONTSIZE
83              Valid font faces are: VGA (sizes  8x8,  8x14,  8x16,  16x28  and
84              16x32),  Terminus  (sizes  6x12, 8x14, 8x16, 10x20, 12x24, 14x28
85              and 16x32), TerminusBold (sizes 8x14, 8x16, 10x20, 12x24,  14x28
86              and  16x32),  TerminusBoldVGA  (sizes  8x14 and 8x16), and Fixed
87              (sizes  8x13,  8x14,  8x15,  8x16   and   8x18).    If   however
88              CODESET=Ethiopian,  then  the  available font faces are Goha and
89              GohaClassic, each in sizes 8x12, 8x14 and 8x16.
90
91              Set FONTFACE and FONTSIZE to empty strings if you want  to  con‐
92              figure  only  the  keyboard  and  to  leave the console font un‐
93              changed.
94
95
96       VIDEOMODE
97              Set VIDEOMODE to an empty string to avoid setting up  the  video
98              mode.  On FreeBSD you can run
99
100                  vidcontrol -i mode
101
102              in  order to see all possible video modes.  On Linux fbset(1) is
103              used to configure the video mode but  very  often  this  doesn't
104              work  because  the default framebuffer driver (VesaFB) is rather
105              limited and doesn't allow changes of the video mode.
106
107
108       FONT, FONT_MAP and CONSOLE_MAP
109              If set, specify that a non standard font is  to  be  used.   The
110              value  of  the variable FONT consists of one or more space sepa‐
111              rated font file names.  On Linux, when the font doesn't  contain
112              embedded  Unicode map, an external map can be specified with the
113              variable FONT_MAP.  The value of  CONSOLE_MAP  is  a  file  that
114              specifies  a  translation  map from the user's 8-bit encoding to
115              Unicode (Linux only) or directly to font positions.
116
117
118       SCREEN_WIDTH and SCREEN_HEIGHT
119              If set, these variables specify a screen size  that  setupcon(1)
120              will enforce with stty(1).  This can be useful with some braille
121              devices that are only 40 cells wide.  The screen  size  can  not
122              exceed  what the current screen resolution can display according
123              to the size of the loaded font.
124
125
126       BEEP   This variable controls the style of the system beep on the  con‐
127              sole.   When unset or when BEEP=default no changes to the system
128              beep will be made.  Other possible values of BEEP are:  standard
129              -  set a standard beep; short - like the standard beep but some‐
130              what shorter; shortest - even more  short,  suitable  when  your
131              work  generates  lots  of beeps; polite - a very short beep with
132              low frequency, suitable when there are other people in the room;
133              attention  -  a  very  long beep, suitable when you want to warn
134              yourself about an occurring event; annoying - also a long  beep,
135              suitable  when you want to warn somebody else about an occurring
136              event; and off - disable the system beep on the console.
137
138

CODESETS

140       There are two kinds of codesets - small (up to 256 symbols) and big (up
141       to 512 symbols).  Only small codesets can be used on FreeBSD.  When the
142       screen is in text mode (i.e. framebuffer is not used) then fonts cover‐
143       ing big codesets will reduce the number of available foreground colors.
144
145
146   Arabic (a big codeset)
147       Supported languages: Arabic, Kurdish in Iran, Pashto, Persian and Urdu.
148
149       Completely  covered  by the following font faces: Fixed (size 8x16) and
150       VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
151
152
153   Armenian
154       Supported language: Armenian.
155
156       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes).
157
158
159   CyrAsia
160       This codeset supports some of the non-Slavic Cyrillic languages -  Abk‐
161       hazia,  Avaric, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Buryat, Chechen, Chuvash, Inupiaq
162       (Eskimo), Kara-Kalpak, Kazakh, Kirgiz, Komi, Kumyk, Kurdish,  Lezghian,
163       Mari  (Cheremis),  Mongolian,  Ossetic, Selkup (Ostyak-Samoyed), Tajik,
164       Tatar, Turkmen, Tuvinian, Uzbek and Yakut.
165
166       Completely supported by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes).
167
168
169   CyrKoi
170       Supports entirely the 8-bit encodings KOI8-R and KOI8-U.  Suitable  for
171       Russian and Ukrainian when one of these two encodings is used.
172
173       Completely  covered  by the following font faces (in all sizes): Fixed,
174       Terminus, TerminusBold, TerminusBoldVGA and VGA.
175
176
177   CyrSlav
178       Supports entirely the 8-bit encodings ISO-8859-5 and CP1251.   Suitable
179       the Slavic Cyrillic languages - Belarusian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Rus‐
180       sian, Serbian and Ukrainian.  For Serbian both  the  Cyrillic  and  the
181       Latin alphabets are supported.
182
183       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes), Ter‐
184       minus (all  sizes),  TerminusBold  (all  sizes),  TerminusBoldVGA  (all
185       sizes), VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
186
187
188   Ethiopian (a big codeset)
189       Supports Amharic, Ethiopic (Geez), Tigre and Tigrinya.
190
191       This  codeset  is  partially covered by the following font faces: Fixed
192       (sizes 8x15 and 8x18), Goha (all sizes) and GohaClassic (all sizes).
193
194
195   Georgian
196       Supported language: Georgian.
197
198       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes).
199
200
201   Greek
202       Supported language: Greek.
203
204       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all  sizes)  and
205       VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
206
207
208   Hebrew
209       Supported languages: Hebrew and Yiddish.
210
211       Completely  covered  by  the  following  font faces: Fixed (sizes 8x13,
212       8x15, 8x16 and 8x18) and VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
213
214
215   Lao
216       Supported languages: Lao.
217
218       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (sizes  8x15  and
219       8x16).
220
221
222   Lat15
223       Covers  entirely  ISO-8859-1, ISO-8859-9 and ISO-8859-15.  Suitable for
224       the so called Latin1 and Latin5 languages - Afar, Afrikaans,  Albanian,
225       Aragonese,  Asturian, Aymara, Basque, Bislama, Breton, Catalan, Chamor‐
226       ro, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Finnish, French,
227       Frisian, Friulian, Galician, German, Hiri Motu, Icelandic, Ido, Indone‐
228       sian, Interlingua, Interlingue, Italian, Low Saxon, Lule  Sami,  Luxem‐
229       bourgish,  Malagasy,  Manx Gaelic, Norwegian Bokmal, Norwegian Nynorsk,
230       Occitan, Oromo or Galla, Portuguese, Rhaeto-Romance  (Romansch),  Scots
231       Gaelic, Somali, South Sami, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tswana, Turkish,
232       Volapuk, Votic, Walloon, Xhosa, Yapese and Zulu.
233
234       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes), Ter‐
235       minus  (all  sizes),  TerminusBold  (all  sizes),  TerminusBoldVGA (all
236       sizes), VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
237
238
239   Lat2
240       Covers entirely ISO-8859-2.  The Euro sign  and  the  Romanian  letters
241       with comma below are also supported.  Suitable for the so called Latin2
242       languages - Bosnian, Croatian, Czech, Hungarian, Polish, Romanian, Slo‐
243       vak, Slovenian and Sorbian (lower and upper).
244
245       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes), Ter‐
246       minus (all  sizes),  TerminusBold  (all  sizes),  TerminusBoldVGA  (all
247       sizes), VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
248
249
250   Lat38
251       Covers  entirely ISO-8859-3 and ISO-8859-14.  Suitable for Chichewa Es‐
252       peranto, Irish, Maltese and Welsh.
253
254       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all  sizes)  and
255       VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
256
257
258   Lat7
259       Covers  entirely  ISO-8859-13.  Suitable for Lithuanian, Latvian, Maori
260       and Marshallese.
261
262       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes), Ter‐
263       minus  (all  sizes),  TerminusBold  (all  sizes),  TerminusBoldVGA (all
264       sizes), VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
265
266
267   Thai
268       Supported language: Thai.
269
270       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes).
271
272
273   Uni1 (a big codeset)
274       Supports most of the Latin languages, the  Slavic  Cyrillic  languages,
275       Hebrew and barely Arabic.
276
277       Completely  covered  by the following font faces: Fixed (sizes 8x15 and
278       8x16) and VGA (all sizes).
279
280
281   Uni2 (a big codeset)
282       Supports most of the Latin languages, the Slavic Cyrillic languages and
283       Greek.
284
285       Completely  covered  by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes) and
286       VGA (sizes 8x16 and 16x32).
287
288
289   Uni3 (a big codeset)
290       Supports most of the Latin and Cyrillic languages.
291
292       Completely covered by the following font faces: Fixed (all sizes).
293
294
295   Vietnamese (a big codeset)
296       Supported language: Vietnamese.
297
298       Completely covered by the following  font  faces:  Fixed  (sizes  8x13,
299       8x15, 8x16 and 8x18).
300
301

FILES

303       The  standard  location  of  the  console-setup  configuration  file is
304       /etc/default/console-setup.  The keyboard configuration is in  /etc/de‐
305       fault/keyboard.  Fonts that can be used with the variable FONT are usu‐
306       ally installed in /usr/share/consolefonts/  or  /lib/kbd/consolefonts/.
307       Translation  maps  that  can  be used with the variable CONSOLE_MAP are
308       usually  installed  in  /usr/share/consoletrans/  or  /lib/kbd/console‐
309       trans/.
310
311

NOTES

313       The aim of the Terminus font is to reduce the eyes-fatigue when one has
314       to read a lot.  Currently this font supports only the Latin, the Cyril‐
315       lic  and  the  Greek  scripts  (the Lat15, Lat2, Lat7, CyrAsia, CyrKoi,
316       CyrSlav, Greek, Uni2 and Uni3 codesets).
317
318       The fonts with font face TerminusBoldVGA are  optimized  for  use  with
319       regular  text  video  modes.   They should not be used with framebuffer
320       video modes.  The fonts with font face TerminusBold are  optimized  for
321       use  with the framebuffer video modes.  The fonts with font face Termi‐
322       nus can be used in all video modes.
323
324

SEE ALSO

326       setupcon(1), keyboard(5), setfont(1), consolechars(1), vidcontrol(1)
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331console-setup                     2011-03-17                  CONSOLE-SETUP(5)
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