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Re: resetting console in text mode
> Sometimes, and only very rarely, my console will lock up.Either I'll
> "be" in text mode, but the screen will just have some graphic junk on it
> even though I can type stuff and see reactions to what I type [in the
> shell], or the keyboard won't work either.
What you described happens if X or an svgalib program crashes before
without restoring text mode.
To restore text mode do the following:
If svgalib supports your video chipset (not with the VESA driver), there
are savetextmode and restoretextmode (part of svgalib). You should run
savetextmode once while in text mode. This will save the video card state
(by default in /etc/vga directory), and later, running restoretextmode
will restore the card to the saved mode (a text mode).
If your card is not supported, there is a program called mode3 in
lrmi-0.6m subdirectory of svgalib (for this program you should use the
latest development version of svgalib, available from www.svgalib.org).
This program uses real mode VESA bios to restore text mode, and is usually
successful (even when the VESA driver is not).
The keyboard problem might be that the keyboard is in raw mode.
If you use kernel 2.2 or later, and enable SysRQ key at compile time, then
Alt-SysRQ-R (at the console) should restore the keyboard to unraw mode.
Otherwise, try running kbd_mode -a.
--
Matan Ziv-Av matan@svgalib.org