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Date:      Fri, 22 Sep 2017 11:14:13 -0600 (MDT)
From:      Warren Block <wblock@wonkity.com>
To:        Polytropon <freebsd@edvax.de>
Cc:        Ian Smith <smithi@nimnet.asn.au>, "Steve O'Hara-Smith" <steve@sohara.org>,  freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: Restoring sc console look and feel with vt
Message-ID:  <alpine.BSF.2.21.1709221038540.83552@wonkity.com>
In-Reply-To: <20170916185812.0ccc21a1.freebsd@edvax.de>
References:  <mailman.83.1505476802.36054.freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> <20170916020243.B81507@sola.nimnet.asn.au> <20170915200315.289b3fdf.freebsd@edvax.de> <20170917011446.F81507@sola.nimnet.asn.au> <20170916185812.0ccc21a1.freebsd@edvax.de>

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On Sat, 16 Sep 2017, Polytropon wrote:

> On Sun, 17 Sep 2017 02:21:51 +1000 (EST), Ian Smith wrote:
>> Are you sure there's no way to use sc(4) with X on 10.3?
>
> The reason why I switched to vt was exactly that reason: with sc
> in place, X wouldn't start anymore. This happened at some point
> during the "updating trail" of 10.1 -> 10.3 with ports updated
> (via pkg). Something that worked for months suddenly stopped
> working, which always is a terrible experience. When I switched
> to vt in the loader, X worked again as it did before.

I'm fairly sure that is due to KMS video.  vt(4) supports it, sc(4) was 
out decades before anyone thought of it.

>From another channel, I've been told that persistently setting the gop 
command in the loader is either not implemented or must be done in one 
of the Forth loader files.  I tried some things with no success yet, and 
have inquiries to dteske@.

>> We saw lots
>> about getting proper console switching going (again) using vt and X on
>> the stable@ list on earlier 10.x, but I can't recall any details, since
>> sc still works fine on my 9.3 (amd64) system, where vt(4) first became
>> available, including proper suspend/resume support from ttyvN or from X.
>
> That is a different problem. Until you start X, sc works perfectly
> fine. Even in a setting where "sc + startx" is working, shutting
> down the X session or switching using e. g. Ctrl+Alt+F1 leaves you
> with a console that works, but without visible text ("blind console").
> With vt, at least this problem is gone, even though the console now
> is visible only with the tiniest letters.

I just tested this on a Haswell notebook with 11-stable.  The mode 
setting is either lost after leaving X, or it just keeps the resolution 
chosen in X.


However, vidfont and vidcontrol work to select a larger font.

   vidfont -p

to print available font names.  Then

   vidcontrol -f vgarom-16x32

to choose one of them.  This can be set in /etc/rc.conf with

   allscreens_flags="-f vgarom-16x13"

It does not take effect until late in the startup, so the boot messages 
are in the default or gop-set mode.

I'm not sure where this should be documented in the Handbook.




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