There are a number of configuration files that are common to all Linux systems. Inputrc deals with the mapping of the keybord in ceratin situations. This file is the start-up file used by readline - the input related library used by bash and most other shells. By changing this file you can change how certain keys act in different situations. The following is a simple inputrc along with comments to explain what the various options do. The following file can be used as /etc/inputrc or ~/.inputrc as appropriate. See below for more details on which to use. Please note that comments can not be on the same line as commands in inputrc. # Make sure we don't output everything on the 1 line set horizontal-scroll-mode Off # Enable 8bit input set meta-flag On set input-meta On # Turns off 8th bit stripping set convert-meta Off # Keep the 8th bit for display set output-meta On # none, visible or audible set bell-style none # All of the following map the escape sequence of the # value contained inside the 1st argument to the # readline specific functions "\eOd": backward-word "\eOc": forward-word # for linux console "\e[1~": beginning-of-line "\e[4~": end-of-line "\e[5~": beginning-of-history "\e[6~": end-of-history "\e[3~": delete-char "\e[2~": quoted-insert # for xterm "\eOH": beginning-of-line "\eOF": end-of-line Please see the manual pages for more information. For more information, look at bash(1) and search for readline, or if you have the readline package installed, look at readline(3). There is a lot that can be done with this single rc file. Note that the readline library checks ~/.inputrc, by default. If you want to use /etc/inputrc as your global inputrc (i.e. for all users), you will need to add the line export INPUTRC=/etc/inputrc to your .bash_profile, .bashrc or .profile file as appropriate. To make the file truly global, you may wish to add it to your /etc/profile file. If you want to use per-user .inputrc files, you can create one and drop it into /etc/skel for use when creating new users.