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<H2><A NAME="s1">1. Useful programs</A></H2>

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<P>The following packages contain keyboard or console related programs.
<P><CODE>kbd-1.06.tar.gz</CODE> contains <CODE>loadkeys</CODE>, <CODE>dumpkeys</CODE>, <CODE>showkey</CODE>,
<CODE>setmetamode</CODE>, <CODE>setleds</CODE>, <CODE>setfont</CODE>, <CODE>showconsolefont</CODE>,
<CODE>mapscrn</CODE>, <CODE>kbd_mode</CODE>, <CODE>kbdrate</CODE>, <CODE>loadunimap</CODE>, <CODE>chvt</CODE>,
<CODE>resizecons</CODE>, <CODE>deallocvt</CODE>, <CODE>getkeycodes</CODE>, <CODE>setkeycodes</CODE>.
It also contains <CODE>openvt</CODE>, formerly called <CODE>open</CODE>.
<P>There exists a clone of the kbd package, namely <CODE>console-tools</CODE>,
that contains more or less the same stuff. The latest version,
<CODE>console-tools-0.3.3</CODE> is roughly up-to-date with <CODE>kbd-0.99</CODE>.
<P><CODE>SVGATextMode-1.10</CODE> contains <CODE>SVGATextMode</CODE>, a program that
obsoletes <CODE>resizecons</CODE>.
<P><CODE>util-linux-2.11</CODE> contains <CODE>setterm</CODE>.
<P><CODE>sh-utils-1.12</CODE> contains <CODE>stty</CODE>.
<P>See also <CODE>dynamic-vc-1.2.tar.gz</CODE> and <CODE>consd-1.3.tgz</CODE> for
programs that exploit the `Keyboard Signal' key. Very primitive
versions are <CODE>spawn_login</CODE> or <CODE>spawn_console</CODE> found in the kbd package.
<P>See 
<A HREF="http://www.cix.co.uk/~mayday/font.tgz">font.tgz</A>
for a package that handles console fonts.
<P>Packages like <CODE>recode</CODE> and <CODE>konwert-1.8</CODE> allow one to convert
between different character encodings.
<P>
<P>The X distribution contains <CODE>xmodmap</CODE>, <CODE>xset</CODE>, <CODE>kbd_mode</CODE>.
(See also X386keybd(1) for the situation under XFree86 1.3,
and Xserver(1) for the XKEYBOARD extension under X11R6.)
A handy interface to <CODE>xmodmap</CODE> is <CODE>xkeycaps</CODE>, see
<A HREF="www.jwz.org/xkeycaps/">http://www.jwz.org/xkeycaps/</A>.
<P><CODE>termcap-2.0.8.tar.gz</CODE> contains <CODE>termcap</CODE>, an old terminal
capabilities data base. <CODE>ncurses-1.9.9e.tar.gz</CODE> contains the
<CODE>termlib</CODE> data base which obsoletes <CODE>termcap</CODE>. (However,
there are still many programs using <CODE>termcap</CODE>.)
<P>See loadkeys(1), setleds(1) and setmetamode(1) for the codes generated by the
various keys and the setting of leds when not under X. Under X, see xmodmap(1)
and xset(1).
<P>See setfont(8) for loading console fonts. Many people will want to
load a font like <CODE>iso01.f16</CODE> because the default font is the
hardware font of the video card, and often is a `Code Page 437' font
missing accented characters and other Latin-1 symbols.
<P>See setterm(1) and kbdrate(8) for properties such as foreground and background
colors, screen blanking and character repeat rate when not under X.
Under X, see xset(1), also for key click and bell volume.
<P>The file <CODE>/etc/termcap</CODE> defines the escape sequences
used by many programs addressing the console (or any other terminal).
See termcap(5).
A more modern version is found in <CODE>/usr/lib/terminfo</CODE>.
See terminfo(5). Terminfo files are compiled
by the terminfo compiler <CODE>/usr/lib/terminfo/tic</CODE>, see tic(1).
Their contents can be examined using the program <CODE>infocmp</CODE>,
see infocmp(1).
<P>The Linux console sequences are documented in console_codes(4).
<P>The package <CODE>funkey</CODE> by Rick van Rein provides support
for all these new keys modern keyboards have. See
<A HREF="http://rick.vanrein.org/linux/funkey">rick.vanrein.org/linux/funkey</A>.
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