[673b0d8] | 1 | <?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
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[b06ca36] | 2 | <!DOCTYPE sect1 PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
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| 3 | "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd" [
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[673b0d8] | 4 | <!ENTITY % general-entities SYSTEM "../general.ent">
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| 5 | %general-entities;
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| 6 | ]>
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[d781ffb] | 7 |
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[7d096f3] | 8 | <sect1 id="ch-scripts-console">
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[d781ffb] | 9 | <?dbhtml filename="console.html"?>
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| 10 |
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| 11 | <title>Configuring the Linux Console</title>
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| 12 |
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| 13 | <indexterm zone="ch-scripts-console">
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| 14 | <primary sortas="d-console">console</primary>
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| 15 | <secondary>configuring</secondary>
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| 16 | </indexterm>
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| 17 |
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| 18 | <para>This section discusses how to configure the <command>console</command>
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[6b13ebc6] | 19 | bootscript that sets up the keyboard map, console font and console kernel log
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| 20 | level. If non-ASCII characters (e.g., the copyright sign, the British pound
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| 21 | sign and Euro symbol) will not be used and the keyboard is a U.S. one, much
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[2ca8941] | 22 | of this section can be skipped. Without the configuration file, (or
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[6b13ebc6] | 23 | equivalent settings in <filename>rc.site</filename>), the
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| 24 | <command>console</command> bootscript will do nothing.</para>
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| 25 |
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| 26 | <para>The <command>console</command> script reads the
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| 27 | <filename>/etc/sysconfig/console</filename> file for configuration
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| 28 | information. Decide which keymap and screen font will be used. Various
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| 29 | language-specific HOWTOs can also help with this, see <ulink
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[fa21b3d] | 30 | url="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX/other-lang.html"/>. If still in
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[6b13ebc6] | 31 | doubt, look in the <filename class="directory">/lib/kbd</filename> directory
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| 32 | for valid keymaps and screen fonts. Read <filename>loadkeys(1)</filename> and
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| 33 | <filename>setfont(8)</filename> manual pages to determine the correct
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| 34 | arguments for these programs.</para>
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[fa21b3d] | 35 |
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| 36 | <para>The <filename>/etc/sysconfig/console</filename> file should contain lines
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| 37 | of the form: VARIABLE="value". The following variables are recognized:</para>
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| 38 |
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| 39 | <variablelist>
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| 40 |
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[479f92f] | 41 | <varlistentry>
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| 42 | <term>LOGLEVEL</term>
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| 43 | <listitem>
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| 44 | <para>This variable specifies the log level for kernel messages sent
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| 45 | to the console as set by <command>dmesg</command>. Valid levels are
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| 46 | from "1" (no messages) to "8". The default level is "7".</para>
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| 47 | </listitem>
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| 48 | </varlistentry>
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| 49 |
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[fa21b3d] | 50 | <varlistentry>
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| 51 | <term>KEYMAP</term>
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| 52 | <listitem>
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| 53 | <para>This variable specifies the arguments for the
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| 54 | <command>loadkeys</command> program, typically, the name of keymap
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| 55 | to load, e.g., <quote>es</quote>. If this variable is not set, the
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[a91be49] | 56 | bootscript will not run the <command>loadkeys</command> program,
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| 57 | and the default kernel keymap will be used.</para>
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[fa21b3d] | 58 | </listitem>
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| 59 | </varlistentry>
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| 60 |
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| 61 | <varlistentry>
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| 62 | <term>KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS</term>
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| 63 | <listitem>
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| 64 | <para>This (rarely used) variable
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| 65 | specifies the arguments for the second call to the
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| 66 | <command>loadkeys</command> program. This is useful if the stock keymap
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| 67 | is not completely satisfactory and a small adjustment has to be made. E.g.,
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| 68 | to include the Euro sign into a keymap that normally doesn't have it,
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| 69 | set this variable to <quote>euro2</quote>.</para>
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| 70 | </listitem>
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| 71 | </varlistentry>
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| 72 |
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| 73 | <varlistentry>
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| 74 | <term>FONT</term>
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| 75 | <listitem>
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| 76 | <para>This variable specifies the arguments for the
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| 77 | <command>setfont</command> program. Typically, this includes the font
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| 78 | name, <quote>-m</quote>, and the name of the application character
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[a91be49] | 79 | map to load. E.g., in order to load the <quote>lat1-16</quote> font
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| 80 | together with the <quote>8859-1</quote> application character map
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[2ca8941] | 81 | (as it is appropriate in the USA),
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[7d6c9a6] | 82 | <!-- because of the copyright sign -->
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[a91be49] | 83 | set this variable to <quote>lat1-16 -m 8859-1</quote>.
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[7d6c9a6] | 84 | In UTF-8 mode, the kernel uses the application character map for
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| 85 | conversion of composed 8-bit key codes in the keymap to UTF-8, and thus
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| 86 | the argument of the "-m" parameter should be set to the encoding of the
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| 87 | composed key codes in the keymap.</para>
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| 88 |
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[fa21b3d] | 89 | </listitem>
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| 90 | </varlistentry>
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| 91 |
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| 92 | <varlistentry>
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| 93 | <term>UNICODE</term>
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| 94 | <listitem>
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| 95 | <para>Set this variable to <quote>1</quote>, <quote>yes</quote> or
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[a91be49] | 96 | <quote>true</quote> in order to put the
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[fa21b3d] | 97 | console into UTF-8 mode. This is useful in UTF-8 based locales and
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| 98 | harmful otherwise.</para>
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| 99 | </listitem>
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| 100 | </varlistentry>
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| 101 |
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| 102 | <varlistentry>
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| 103 | <term>LEGACY_CHARSET</term>
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| 104 | <listitem>
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| 105 | <para>For many keyboard layouts, there is no stock Unicode keymap in
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| 106 | the Kbd package. The <command>console</command> bootscript will
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| 107 | convert an available keymap to UTF-8 on the fly if this variable is
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[a91be49] | 108 | set to the encoding of the available non-UTF-8 keymap.</para>
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[fa21b3d] | 109 | </listitem>
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| 110 | </varlistentry>
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| 111 |
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| 112 | </variablelist>
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| 113 |
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| 114 | <para>Some examples:</para>
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| 115 |
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| 116 | <itemizedlist>
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| 117 |
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| 118 | <listitem>
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| 119 | <para>For a non-Unicode setup, only the KEYMAP and FONT variables are
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| 120 | generally needed. E.g., for a Polish setup, one would use:</para>
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| 121 |
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| 122 | <screen role="nodump"><userinput>cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
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| 123 | <literal># Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
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| 124 |
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| 125 | KEYMAP="pl2"
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| 126 | FONT="lat2a-16 -m 8859-2"
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| 127 |
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| 128 | # End /etc/sysconfig/console</literal>
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[f67f5cf] | 129 | EOF</userinput></screen>
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[fa21b3d] | 130 | </listitem>
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[b32e803] | 131 |
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[fa21b3d] | 132 | <listitem>
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| 133 | <para>As mentioned above, it is sometimes necessary to adjust a
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| 134 | stock keymap slightly. The following example adds the Euro symbol to the
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| 135 | German keymap:</para>
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[81fd230] | 136 |
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[fa21b3d] | 137 | <screen role="nodump"><userinput>cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
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| 138 | <literal># Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
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| 139 |
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| 140 | KEYMAP="de-latin1"
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| 141 | KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS="euro2"
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| 142 | FONT="lat0-16 -m 8859-15"
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| 143 |
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| 144 | # End /etc/sysconfig/console</literal>
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[81fd230] | 145 | EOF</userinput></screen>
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[fa21b3d] | 146 | </listitem>
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[81fd230] | 147 |
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[fa21b3d] | 148 | <listitem>
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[49451499] | 149 | <para>The following is a Unicode-enabled example for Bulgarian, where a
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| 150 | stock UTF-8 keymap exists:</para>
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[5536f74] | 151 |
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[fa21b3d] | 152 | <screen role="nodump"><userinput>cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
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| 153 | <literal># Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
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| 154 |
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| 155 | UNICODE="1"
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| 156 | KEYMAP="bg_bds-utf8"
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| 157 | FONT="LatArCyrHeb-16"
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| 158 |
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| 159 | # End /etc/sysconfig/console</literal>
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| 160 | EOF</userinput></screen>
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| 161 | </listitem>
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| 162 |
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| 163 | <listitem>
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| 164 | <para>Due to the use of a 512-glyph LatArCyrHeb-16 font in the previous
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| 165 | example, bright colors are no longer available on the Linux console unless
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| 166 | a framebuffer is used. If one wants to have bright colors without
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| 167 | framebuffer and can live without characters not belonging to his language,
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| 168 | it is still possible to use a language-specific 256-glyph font, as
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[f19e766] | 169 | illustrated below:</para>
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[81fd230] | 170 |
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[fa21b3d] | 171 | <screen role="nodump"><userinput>cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
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| 172 | <literal># Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
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| 173 |
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| 174 | UNICODE="1"
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| 175 | KEYMAP="bg_bds-utf8"
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| 176 | FONT="cyr-sun16"
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| 177 |
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| 178 | # End /etc/sysconfig/console</literal>
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[f67f5cf] | 179 | EOF</userinput></screen>
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[fa21b3d] | 180 | </listitem>
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| 181 |
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| 182 | <listitem>
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[7d6c9a6] | 183 | <para>The following example illustrates keymap autoconversion from
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| 184 | ISO-8859-15 to UTF-8 and enabling dead keys in Unicode mode:</para>
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[fa21b3d] | 185 |
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| 186 | <screen role="nodump"><userinput>cat > /etc/sysconfig/console << "EOF"
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| 187 | <literal># Begin /etc/sysconfig/console
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[b32e803] | 188 |
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[fa21b3d] | 189 | UNICODE="1"
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[7d6c9a6] | 190 | KEYMAP="de-latin1"
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| 191 | KEYMAP_CORRECTIONS="euro2"
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| 192 | LEGACY_CHARSET="iso-8859-15"
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| 193 | FONT="LatArCyrHeb-16 -m 8859-15"
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[b32e803] | 194 |
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[fa21b3d] | 195 | # End /etc/sysconfig/console</literal>
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[f67f5cf] | 196 | EOF</userinput></screen>
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[fa21b3d] | 197 | </listitem>
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[b32e803] | 198 |
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[49451499] | 199 | <listitem>
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| 200 | <para>Some keymaps have dead keys (i.e., keys that don't produce a
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| 201 | character by themselves, but put an accent on the character produced
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| 202 | by the next key) or define composition rules (such as: <quote>press
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| 203 | Ctrl+. A E to get Æ</quote> in the default keymap).
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[7d6c9a6] | 204 | Linux-&linux-version; interprets dead keys and composition rules in the
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| 205 | keymap correctly only when the source characters to be composed together
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| 206 | are not multibyte. This deficiency doesn't affect keymaps for European
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| 207 | languages, because there accents are added to unaccented ASCII
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| 208 | characters, or two ASCII characters are composed together. However, in
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| 209 | UTF-8 mode it is a problem, e.g., for the Greek language, where one
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[53eeda09] | 210 | sometimes needs to put an accent on the letter <quote>alpha</quote>.
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[7d6c9a6] | 211 | The solution is either to avoid the use of UTF-8, or to install the
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| 212 | X window system that doesn't have this limitation in its input
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| 213 | handling.</para>
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[49451499] | 214 | </listitem>
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| 215 |
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[fa21b3d] | 216 | <listitem>
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| 217 | <para>For Chinese, Japanese, Korean and some other languages, the Linux
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| 218 | console cannot be configured to display the needed characters. Users
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| 219 | who need such languages should install the X Window System, fonts that
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| 220 | cover the necessary character ranges, and the proper input method (e.g.,
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| 221 | SCIM, it supports a wide variety of languages).</para>
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| 222 | </listitem>
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| 223 |
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| 224 | </itemizedlist>
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| 225 |
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| 226 | <!-- Added because folks keep posting their console file with X questions
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| 227 | to blfs-support list -->
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| 228 | <note>
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[49451499] | 229 | <para>The <filename>/etc/sysconfig/console</filename> file only controls the Linux text console localization. It has nothing to do with setting the
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| 230 | proper keyboard layout and terminal fonts in the X Window System, with ssh
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| 231 | sessions or with a serial console. In such situations, limitations mentioned
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| 232 | in the last two list items above do not apply.</para>
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[fa21b3d] | 233 | </note>
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[81fd230] | 234 |
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[1050066] | 235 | </sect1>
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