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mapscrn(8) — Linux manual page

NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | USE | INPUT FORMAT | OPTIONS | FILES | SEE ALSO | AUTHOR | COLOPHON 

MAPSCRN(8)               System Manager's Manual               MAPSCRN(8)

NAME         top

       mapscrn - load screen output mapping table

SYNOPSIS         top

       mapscrn [options] mapfile

DESCRIPTION         top

       The mapscrn command is obsolete - its function is now built-in
       into setfont.  However, for backwards compatibility it is still
       available as a separate command.

       The mapscrn command loads a user defined output character mapping
       table into the console driver. The console driver may be later put
       into use user-defined mapping table mode by outputting a special
       escape sequence to the console device.  This sequence is <esc>(K
       for the G0 character set and <esc>)K for the G1 character set.
       When the -o option is given, the old map is saved in map.orig.

USE         top

       There are two kinds of mapping tables: direct-to-font tables, that
       give a font position for each user byte value, and user-to-unicode
       tables that give a unicode value for each user byte. The
       corresponding glyph is now found using the unicode index of the
       font.  The command
              mapscrn trivial
       sets up a one-to-one direct-to-font table where user bytes
       directly address the font. This is useful for fonts that are in
       the same order as the character set one uses.  A command like
              mapscrn 8859-2
       sets up a user-to-unicode table that assumes that the user uses
       ISO 8859-2.

INPUT FORMAT         top

       The mapscrn command can read the map in either of two formats:
       1. 256 or 512 bytes binary data
       2. two-column text file
       Format (1) is a direct image of the translation table. The
       256-bytes tables are direct-to-font, the 512-bytes tables are
       user-to-unicode tables.  Format (2) is used to fill the table as
       follows: cell with offset mentioned in the first column is filled
       with the value mentioned in the second column.  When values larger
       than 255 occur, or values are written using the U+xxxx notation,
       the table is assumed to be a user-to-unicode table, otherwise it
       is a direct-to-font table.

       Values in the file may be specified in one of several formats:
       1. Decimal: String of decimal digits not starting with '0'
       2. Octal: String of octal digits beginning with '0'.
       3. Hexadecimal: String of hexadecimal digits preceded by "0x".
       4. Unicode: String of four hexadecimal digits preceded by "U+".
       5. Character: Single character enclosed in single quotes. (And the
       binary value is used.)  Note that blank, comma, tab character and
       '#' cannot be specified with this format.
       6. UTF-8 Character: Single (possibly multi-byte) UTF-8 character,
       enclosed in single quotes.

       Note that control characters (with codes < 32) cannot be re-mapped
       with mapscrn because they have special meaning for the driver.

OPTIONS         top

       -o, --output=FILE
              save the old map to the FILE.

       -C, --console=DEV
              the console device to be used.

       -v, --verbose
              be more verbose.

       -V, --version
              print version number.

       -h, --help
              print this usage message.

FILES         top

       /usr/local/share/consoletrans
              The default directory for screen mappings.

SEE ALSO         top

       setfont(8)

AUTHOR         top

       Copyright (C) 1993 Eugene G. Crosser
       <crosser@pccross.msk.su>
       This software and documentation may be distributed freely.

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of the kbd (Linux keyboard tools) project.
       Information about the project can be found at 
       ⟨http://www.kbd-project.org/⟩.  If you have a bug report for this
       manual page, send it to kbd@lists.altlinux.org.  This page was
       obtained from the project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨https://github.com/legionus/kbd.git⟩ on 2025-08-11.  (At that
       time, the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
       repository was 2025-07-01.)  If you discover any rendering
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       a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
       corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
       (which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
       man-pages@man7.org

kbd                          24 October 2024                   MAPSCRN(8)

Pages that refer to this page: ioctl_console(2),  console_codes(4),  loadunimap(8),  setfont(8)

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