Developer's Daily | Unix by Example |
main | java | perl | unix | dev directory | web log |
consolechars - load EGA/VGA console screen font, screen-font map, and/or application-charset map. |
consolechars [-v|--verbose] [-V|--version] [-h|--help] [-1|--g1] [-n|--no-act] [--force-no-sfm] [-H|--char-height=N] [--tty=device] [-m|--acm=|--app-charset-map=acm] [-M|--old-acm=acm.orig] [-f|--font=font.new] [-F|--old-font=font.orig] [--old-font-raw=font.orig] [--old-font-psf-with-sfm=font.orig.psf] [--old-font-psf=font.orig.psf] [-u|--sfm=|--screen-font-map=sfm] [-U|--old-sfm=sfm.orig] [-k|--sfm-fallback] |
The consolechars command loads a font into the EGA/VGA character generator, and optionally outputs the previous font. This command reads an 8xH font from the file and loads it into the character generator memory. Usually the font size H will be read from the file, but some file-formats do not contain enough information for this, especially the raw file format, which only contains the font bitmaps. In this case, H will be computed from the file size, which implies these files cannot be compressed. If the input file has codepage format, containing the three fonts 8x8, 8x14 and 8x16, one of the options -H 8, -H 14 or -H 16 must be used to select one. Codepage format is also recognized by size, and cannot be compressed. As currently there is no mode switching support in the Linux kernel, consolechars has nothing to do with the current EGA/VGA mode. It’s totally user’s responsibility to choose a font matching the current video mode. |
-h --help |
Display a short help message and exit. |
-V --version |
Display version-number and exit. |
-v --verbose |
Display on stderr informations on what’s going on. |
-n --no_act |
Do not change the console state; do not write anything to any file. Implies --verbose. |
-1 --g1 |
Activate the G1 charset instead of G0 (see --acm). |
--tty=device |
Use device as console device for ioctls, instead of guessing which one to use, which usually chooses the current tty. This can be useful for testing when under X, in conjunction with --no-act ? actual ioctls are refused for some reason then. |
-f --font=file |
The font file is a file containing the bitmap-description (glyph) of characters. Since fonts may contain the glyphs for arbitrary character-sets, knowledge about these characters may come either in the font-file (eg. in PSF files), or in separate screen-font-map files (see --sfm option). Font-files can be compressed with gzip(1) or compress(1), with the exception of raw and codepage file-formats. Raw font files are binary files of size 256*H bytes, containing bit images for each of 256 characters, one byte per scan line, and H bytes per character (0 < H <= 32); H is computed from the file-size, thus raw font files cannot be compressed. The other font-formats are described elsewhere. |
-d --default-font |
Load a default font. The -H option can be given to force a given char-height. |
-m --acm --app-charset-map=file |
Load a user-defined Application-Charset Map (ACM)
- save current ACM. There are 2 types of ACM’s recognized by the
--acm option, which can be fed in binary or ASCII
form. Binary maps are checked by size, and contain an array
of 256 bytes (old style 8-bit to font-position maps) or 256
unicodes (8-bit to UCS2 maps). Because of this check, you
should not compress or pipe them. |
-M --old-acm=file |
Saves the previous ACM can be saved to a file. |
-u --sfm --screen-font-map=file |
Load a Screen Font Map (SFM) |
--force-no-sfm |
Prevent the loading of a SFM when loading a font containing one. You should use this option with care, as you probably don’t want to have a font without a SFM; it could cause trouble. |
-U --old-sfm=file |
Save current SFM into a file. |
-k --sfm-fallback=file |
Use the given file as a SFM fallback table, to supplement the SFM. Multiple -k options may be given. A fallback table tells, for some UCS2 characters you’re interested to display, which character’s glyph it may use if its own is not available according to the SFM in use. If a SFM was to be loaded, fallback mappings are added to this map before it is loaded. If there was not (ie. no --sfm option was given, and a font without SFM was loaded, or the --force-no-sfm option was given), then the current SFM is requested from the kernel, the the fallback mappings are added, and the resulting SFM is loaded. |
-F --old-font=file |
Save old font in the prefered format. It is currently the same as using --old-font-psf-with-sfm, but may change when a better format is supported. |
--old-font-psf-with-sfm=file |
Save old font in PSF format, with corresponding SFM (PSF mode 2 or 3). |
--old-font-psf=file |
Save old font in PSF format (PSF mode 0 or 1). Usually a bad idea. |
--old-font-raw=file |
Save old font in RAW format. Usually an even worse idea. |
-H --char-height=N |
When loading a font from a codepage file, or a default font, specify which font-size to use. N should be a number between 1 and 31. |
consolechars was originally called setfont(8), but was renamed (in version 1997.10.28 of the Linux Console Tools) to allow for changing the command-line options while providing backward compatibility with the old ‘kbd’ package. |
/usr/lib/kbd/consolefonts/ is the default directory for fonts. /usr/lib/kbd/consoletrans/ is the default directory for both ACM’s and SFM’s. |
For implementation reasons, binary ACM’s and ASCII 8-bit ACM’s cannot be compressed nor piped. This is not likely to change (except if a good reason is given to the maintainer, or a patch is submitted), because I consider these formats to be obsolete. |
Eugene G. Crosser <crosser@pccross.msk.su> |
psfaddtable(1), psfstriptable(1). |