1KEYBOARD(5) Console-setup User's Manual KEYBOARD(5)
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6 keyboard - keyboard configuration file
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9 The keyboard file describes the properties of the keyboard. It is read
10 by setupcon(1) in order to configure the keyboard on the console. In
11 Debian systems the default keyboard layout is described in /etc/de‐
12 fault/keyboard and it is shared between X and the console.
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14 The specification of the keyboard layout in the keyboard file is based
15 on the XKB options XkbModel, XkbLayout, XkbVariant and XkbOptions. Un‐
16 fortunately, there is little documentation how to use them. Descrip‐
17 tion of all possible values for these options can be found in the file
18 base.lst.
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20 You might want to read “The XKB Configuration Guide” by Kamil Toman and
21 Ivan U. Pascal:
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23 http://www.xfree86.org/current/XKB-Config.html
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25 Other possible readings are:
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27 https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/X_KeyBoard_extension
28 http://pascal.tsu.ru/en/xkb/
29 http://www.charvolant.org/~doug/xkb/
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31 The complete XKB-specification can be found on
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33 http://xfree86.org/current/XKBproto.pdf
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35 The file keyboard consists of variable settings in POSIX format:
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37 VARIABLE=VALUE
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39 Only one assignment is allowed per line. Comments (starting with '#')
40 are also allowed.
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44 The following variables can be set.
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47 XKBMODEL
48 Specifies the XKB keyboard model name. Default: pc105 on most
49 platforms.
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52 XKBLAYOUT
53 Specifies the XKB keyboard layout name. This is usually the
54 country or language type of the keyboard. Default: us on most
55 platforms
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58 XKBVARIANT
59 Specifies the XKB keyboard variant components. These can be used
60 to further specify the keyboard layout details. Default: not
61 set.
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64 XKBOPTIONS
65 Specifies the XKB keyboard option components. Options usually
66 relate to the behavior of the special keys (<Shift>, <Control>,
67 <Alt>, <CapsLock>, etc.) Default: not set.
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70 BACKSPACE
71 Determines the behavior of <BackSpace> and <Delete> keys on the
72 console. Allowed values: bs, del and guess. In most cases you
73 can specify guess here, in which case the current terminal set‐
74 tings and the kernel of your operating system will be used to
75 determine the correct value. Value bs specifies VT100-confor‐
76 mant behavior: <BackSpace> will generate ^H (ASCII BS) and
77 <Delete> will generate ^? (ASCII DEL). Value del specifies
78 VT220-conformant behavior: <BackSpace> will generate ^? (ASCII
79 DEL) and <Delete> will generate a special function sequence.
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82 KMAP Usually this variable will be unset but if you don't want to use
83 a XKB layout on the console, you can specify an alternative
84 keymap here. Specify a file that is suitable as input for load‐
85 keys(1) on Linux or for kbdcontrol(1) on FreeBSD.
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89 The standard location of the keyboard file is /etc/default/keyboard.
90 Description of all available keyboard models, layouts, variants and op‐
91 tions is available in /usr/share/X11/xkb/rules/base.lst. In most cas‐
92 es, in /lib/kbd/keymaps/ you will find several keymaps that can be used
93 with the variable KMAP.
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97 In Debian systems, changes in /etc/default/keyboard do not become imme‐
98 diately visible to X. You should either reboot the system, or use
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100 udevadm trigger --subsystem-match=input --action=change
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102 In order to activate the changes on the console, run setupcon(1).
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106 When a triple-layout is used on the console, i.e. a layout with three
107 XKB groups, then the group toggling happens in the following way:
108 Group1 -> Group2 -> Group1 -> Group3.
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110 On FreeBSD triple- and quadruple-layouts are not supported on the con‐
111 sole (only the first and the second layout are taken into account).
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113 The option grp:shifts_toggle is not supported on the console.
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117 The following configuration will give you the standard US QWERTY layout
118 (us). The key <Menu> will act as a compose key (compose:menu) and
119 <CapsLock> will act as third control key (ctrl:nocaps).
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121 XKBLAYOUT=us
122 XKBVARIANT=
123 XKBOPTIONS=compose:menu,ctrl:nocaps
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125 In the following configuration the right <Alt> key (grp:toggle) will
126 toggle between US QWERTY layout (us) and Greek (gr) layout. The option
127 grp_led:scroll is ignored on the console but in X in means to use the
128 ScrollLock keyboard led as indicator for the current layout (US or
129 Greek).
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131 XKBLAYOUT=us,gr
132 XKBVARIANT=
133 XKBOPTIONS=grp:toggle,grp_led:scroll
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135 In the following configuration the <Control>+<Shift> key combination
136 will toggle (grp:ctrl_shift_toggle) between French keyboard (fr) with‐
137 out dead keys (nodeadkeys) and British (gb) “Dvorak” (dvorak) keyboard.
138 The right <Win> key will be a compose-key (compose:rwin) and the right
139 <Alt> key will function as AltGr (lv3:lalt_switch).
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141 XKBLAYOUT=fr,gb
142 XKBVARIANT=nodeadkeys,dvorak
143 XKBOPTIONS=grp:ctrl_shift_toggle,compose:rwin,lv3:ralt_switch
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147 setupcon(1), ckbcomp(1), console-setup(5), loadkeys(1), kbdcontrol(1)
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151console-setup 2011-03-17 KEYBOARD(5)