vtlmgr(1) UNIX System V(Essential Utilities) vtlmgr(1)
NAME
vtlmgr - monitors and opens virtual terminals.
SYNOPSIS
vtlmgr [-k]
DESCRIPTION
When you invoke the vtlmgr command (usually from within your .profile),
it places itself in the background and monitors /dev/vtmon for signals
from the keyboard/display driver to open new virtual terminals.
Option:
-k The -k option sends a SIGHUP signal to all open virtual terminals
when you log off (by entering CTRL-d from your home virtual
terminal). This automatically closes, if possible, existing
virtual terminals. For virtual terminals that cannot be
automatically closed, you are asked if you want to close them
manually.
After running vtlmgr, you open new virtual terminals and then switch
between them by entering a hot-key sequence, specifically:
ALT - SYS-REQ key
where key is either a function key whose number corresponds to the number
of the virtual terminal to switch to, for example, pressing F1 switches
you to /dev/vt01 (virtual terminal 01), pressing F2 switches you to
/dev/vt02 (virtual terminal 02), and so forth, or one of the letters in
the following table:
____________________________________________
| key Interpretation |
|___________________________________________|
| h home virtual terminal (/dev/vt00) |
| n next virtual terminal |
| p previous virtual terminal |
| f force a switch to a virtual terminal|
|___________________________________________|
Use the f key only when the current virtual terminal is essentially
locked up or stuck in graphics mode. This will cause the virtual terminal
to be reset to a sane text state and all processes associated with the
virtual terminal will be killed.
When the hot-key sequence is entered, the executable program pointed to
by the $SHELL variable is executed in the new virtual terminal. If
$SHELL is NULL or pointing to a program which is not executable, /bin/sh
is executed. The newly opened virtual terminal inherits the environment
in effect when the vtlmgr command is invoked.
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vtlmgr(1) UNIX System V(Essential Utilities) vtlmgr(1)
You may perform setup on each new virtual terminal as it is created by
vtlmgr through the .vtlrc file. This file should be in your home
directory. Its contents are a shell script that will be run by /bin/sh
before the shell prompt is displayed. In this way it is similar to your
.profile file. However, you may not set and export environment variables
to the shell for the virtual terminal because a different shell runs the
.vtlrc shell script.
The system administrator can control how many virtual terminals are
available by setting a parameter in the file /etc/default/workstations.
Virtual terminals 0 - 8 are configured by default and the default
keyboard map makes up to 13 virtual terminals available (i.e., an
additional 4 virtual terminals can readily be defined within the default
settings). The default virtual terminals are the home terminal and one
corresponding to each function key. An application can make two more
available to the end-user (by reprogramming the keyboard map), or can
reserve the last two for programmatic use only, making 15 virtual
terminals available in all.
Note that processes that are no longer visible may still be continuing.
Standard output is directed to the current virtual terminal's screen.
For example, you can issue a cat command on one virtual terminal, switch
to another virtual terminal to start an application, and then switch to
another to do an edit. The cat output will be lost if the virtual
terminal scrolls the data off the screen unless you initially redirect
the output to a file.
DIAGNOSTICS
The vtlmgr command will fail under the following conditions:
If an illegal option is specified.
If the device cannot be opened.
If the command is invoked from a remote terminal.
If /dev/vtmon cannot be opened.
If $SHELL is set and is not executable.
If $SHELL is not set and /bin/sh cannot be invoked.
SEE ALSO
newvt(1M)
vtgetty(1M), keyboard(7) in the System Administrator's Reference Manual
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