Manual: setupcon

SETUPCON(1) Console-setup User's Manual SETUPCON(1)

NAME
setupcon - sets up the font and the keyboard on the console

SYNOPSIS
setupcon [OPTION]... [VARIANT]

DESCRIPTION
setupcon is a program for fast and easy setup of the font and the keyboard on the console. Most of the time you in‐
voke setupcon without arguments. The keyboard configuration is specified in ~/.keyboard or /etc/default/keyboard.
The font configuration is specified in ~/.console-setup or /etc/default/console-setup. Consult keyboard(5) and con‐
sole-setup(5) for instructions how to configure these two files.

If you have to switch often between different encodings, keyboards or languages, you can prepare several alternative
configuration files for setupcon. Suppose that most of the time you will use Greek language with Greek keyboard lay‐
out, but sometimes you need to type in German with German keyboard layout. In this situation you should customize
the main configuration files (keyboard and console-setup) for Greek. Also, create alternative configuration files
for German named keyboard.german and console-setup.german. Then in order to configure the console for Greek you will
simply run the command with no arguments: setupcon and in order to configure the console for German you will use
setupcon german.

OPTIONS
VARIANT
Specifies which configuration file to use. With no variant, the configuration files of setupcon are named
console-setup and keyboard. On the other hand, if you use e.g. chukchi as VARIANT then the configuration
files are console-setup.chukchi and keyboard.chukchi. In this way you can have easy access to several differ‐
ent configurations - for example one for the Chukchi language and another for the default configuration.

-v, --verbose
Be more verbose. Use this option if something goes wrong or while experimenting with the configuration
files.

-k, --keyboard-only
Setup the keyboard only, do not setup the font or the terminal. On Linux it is enough to do this configura‐
tion only once.

-f, --font-only
Setup the font only, do not setup the keyboard or the terminal. On Linux this configuration should be repeat‐
ed each time a new console driver is activated (for example when the frame buffer becomes active).

-t, --terminal-only
Setup the terminal only, do not setup the keyboard or the font.

--current-tty
Setup the only the current virtual terminal.

--force
Do not check whether we are on the console. Notice that you can be forced to hard-reboot your computer if you
run setupcon with this option and the screen is controlled by a X server.

--save This option can be useful if you want to use setupcon early in the boot process while /usr is not yet mounted
and the required data are not available. This option will make setupcon copy the required files in /etc/con‐
sole-setup/ in order to make them available before /usr is mounted. If you use setupcon early in the boot
process, then you should run it with this option after every change of the console configuration.

--save-only
The same as --save, but does not setup anything. This option can be useful if you want to save the required
files while the screen is controlled by a X server.

--save-keyboard FILE
For use by initrd builders. Do not configure anything. Save an usable keyboard layout in FILE.

--setup-dir DIR
For use by initrd builders. Do not configure anything. Arrange in the directory DIR everything necessary in
order to configure the console. The file DIR/morefiles lists all binaries the initrd builder has to install
in the initrd image. All other files in DIR have to be copied unchanged in the initrd. In order to configure
the console one has to run the script DIR/bin/setupcon.

-h, --help
Display usage information.

FILES
~/.console-setup
~/.keyboard
/etc/default/console-setup
/etc/default/keyboard
/etc/default/console-setup.VARIANT
/etc/default/keyboard.VARIANT
/etc/console-setup/

Manual: setupcon

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