ViewVC Help

View File | Revision Log | Show Annotations | Download File

/cvs/rxvt-unicode/README.FAQ

Comparing rxvt-unicode/README.FAQ (file contents):
Revision 1.37 by root, Tue Jan 31 00:58:20 2006 UTC vs.
Revision 1.57 by root, Wed Dec 30 06:14:03 2009 UTC

1	FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS	1	RXVT-UNICODE/URXVT FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
2	The new selection selects pieces that are too big, how can I select	2	Meta, Features & Commandline Issues
3	single words?	3	My question isn't answered here, can I ask a human?
4	If you want to select e.g. alphanumeric words, you can use the following	4	Before sending me mail, you could go to IRC: "irc.freenode.net", channel
5	setting:	5	"#rxvt-unicode" has some rxvt-unicode enthusiasts that might be
		6	interested in learning about new and exciting problems (but not FAQs :).
6		7
7	URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([[:word:]]+)	8	I use Gentoo, and I have a problem...
		9	There are three big problems with Gentoo Linux: first of all, most if
		10	not all Gentoo systems are completely broken (missing or mismatched
		11	header files, broken compiler etc. are just the tip of the iceberg);
		12	secondly, the Gentoo maintainer thinks it is a good idea to add broken
		13	patches to the code; and lastly, it should be called Gentoo GNU/Linux.
8		14
9	If you click more than twice, the selection will be extended more and	15	For these reasons, it is impossible to support rxvt-unicode on Gentoo.
10	more.	16	Problems appearing on Gentoo systems will usually simply be ignored
		17	unless they can be reproduced on non-Gentoo systems.
11		18
12	To get a selection that is very similar to the old code, try this	19	Does it support tabs, can I have a tabbed rxvt-unicode?
13	pattern:	20	Beginning with version 7.3, there is a perl extension that implements a
		21	simple tabbed terminal. It is installed by default, so any of these
		22	should give you tabs:
14		23
15	URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([^"&'()*,;<=>?@[\\\\]^`{|})]+)	24	urxvt -pe tabbed
16		25
17	Please also note that the *LeftClick Shift-LeftClik* combination also
18	selects words like the old code.
19
20	I don't like the new selection/popups/hotkeys/perl, how do I
21	change/disable it?
22	You can disable the perl extension completely by setting the
23	perl-ext-common resource to the empty string, which also keeps
24	rxvt-unicode from initialising perl, saving memory.
25
26	If you only want to disable specific features, you first have to
27	identify which perl extension is responsible. For this, read the section
28	PREPACKAGED EXTENSIONS in the rxvtperl(3) manpage. For example, to
29	disable the selection-popup and option-popup, specify this
30	perl-ext-common resource:
31
32	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-selection-popup,-option-popup
33
34	This will keep the default extensions, but disable the two popup
35	extensions. Some extensions can also be configured, for example,
36	scrollback search mode is triggered by M-s. You can move it to any other
37	combination either by setting the searchable-scrollback resource:
38
39	URxvt.searchable-scrollback: CM-s
40
41	The cursor moves when selecting text in the current input line, how
42	do I switch this off?
43	During rlogin/ssh/telnet/etc. sessions, clicking near the cursor
44	outputs strange escape sequences, how do I fix this?
45	These are caused by the "readline" perl extension. Under normal
46	circumstances, it will move your cursor around when you click into the
47	line that contains it. It tries hard not to do this at the wrong moment,
48	but when running a program that doesn't parse cursor movements or in
49	some cases during rlogin sessions, it fails to detect this properly.
50
51	You can permamently switch this feature off by disabling the "readline"
52	extension:
53
54	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-readline	26	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,tabbed
55		27
56	Why doesn't rxvt-unicode read my resources?	28	It will also work fine with tabbing functionality of many window
57	Well, why, indeed? It does, in a way very similar to other X	29	managers or similar tabbing programs, and its embedding-features allow
58	applications. Most importantly, this means that if you or your OS loads	30	it to be embedded into other programs, as witnessed by doc/rxvt-tabbed
59	resources into the X display (the right way to do it), rxvt-unicode will	31	or the upcoming "Gtk2::URxvt" perl module, which features a tabbed urxvt
60	ignore any resource files in your home directory. It will only read	32	(murxvt) terminal as an example embedding application.
61	$HOME/.Xdefaults when no resources are attached to the display.
62		33
63	If you have or use an $HOME/.Xresources file, chances are that resources	34	How do I know which rxvt-unicode version I'm using?
64	are loaded into your X-server. In this case, you have to re-login after	35	The version number is displayed with the usage (-h). Also the escape
65	every change (or run xrdb -merge $HOME/.Xresources).	36	sequence "ESC [ 8 n" sets the window title to the version number. When
		37	using the urxvtc client, the version displayed is that of the daemon.
66		38
67	Also consider the form resources have to use:	39	Rxvt-unicode uses gobs of memory, how can I reduce that?
		40	Rxvt-unicode tries to obey the rule of not charging you for something
		41	you don't use. One thing you should try is to configure out all settings
		42	that you don't need, for example, Xft support is a resource hog by
		43	design, when used. Compiling it out ensures that no Xft font will be
		44	loaded accidentally when rxvt-unicode tries to find a font for your
		45	characters.
68		46
69	URxvt.resource: value	47	Also, many people (me included) like large windows and even larger
		48	scrollback buffers: Without "--enable-unicode3", rxvt-unicode will use 6
		49	bytes per screen cell. For a 160x?? window this amounts to almost a
		50	kilobyte per line. A scrollback buffer of 10000 lines will then (if
		51	full) use 10 Megabytes of memory. With "--enable-unicode3" it gets
		52	worse, as rxvt-unicode then uses 8 bytes per screen cell.
70		53
71	If you want to use another form (there are lots of different ways of	54	How can I start urxvtd in a race-free way?
72	specifying resources), make sure you understand wether and why it works.	55	Try "urxvtd -f -o", which tells urxvtd to open the display, create the
73	If unsure, use the form above.	56	listening socket and then fork.
74		57
75	I can't get transparency working, what am I doing wrong?	58	How can I start urxvtd automatically when I run urxvtc?
76	First of all, transparency isn't officially supported in rxvt-unicode,	59	If you want to start urxvtd automatically whenever you run urxvtc and
77	so you are mostly on your own. Do not bug the author about it (but you	60	the daemon isn't running yet, use this script:
78	may bug everybody else). Also, if you can't get it working consider it a
79	rite of passage: ... and you failed.
80		61
81	Here are four ways to get transparency. Do read the manpage and option	62	#!/bin/sh
82	descriptions for the programs mentioned and rxvt-unicode. Really, do it!	63	urxvtc "$@"
		64	if [ $? -eq 2 ]; then
		65	urxvtd -q -o -f
		66	urxvtc "$@"
		67	fi
83		68
84	1. Use inheritPixmap:	69	This tries to create a new terminal, and if fails with exit status 2,
		70	meaning it couldn't connect to the daemon, it will start the daemon and
		71	re-run the command. Subsequent invocations of the script will re-use the
		72	existing daemon.
85		73
86	Esetroot wallpaper.jpg	74	How do I distinguish whether I'm running rxvt-unicode or a regular xterm? I need this to decide about setting colors etc.
87	rxvt -ip -tint red -sh 40	75	The original rxvt and rxvt-unicode always export the variable
		76	"COLORTERM", so you can check and see if that is set. Note that several
		77	programs, JED, slrn, Midnight Commander automatically check this
		78	variable to decide whether or not to use color.
88		79
89	That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack transparency and tinting	80	How do I set the correct, full IP address for the DISPLAY variable?
90	support, or you are unable to read.	81	If you've compiled rxvt-unicode with DISPLAY_IS_IP and have enabled
		82	insecure mode then it is possible to use the following shell script
		83	snippets to correctly set the display. If your version of rxvt-unicode
		84	wasn't also compiled with ESCZ_ANSWER (as assumed in these snippets)
		85	then the COLORTERM variable can be used to distinguish rxvt-unicode from
		86	a regular xterm.
91		87
92	2. Use a simple pixmap and emulate pseudo-transparency. This enables you	88	Courtesy of Chuck Blake <cblake@BBN.COM> with the following shell script
93	to use effects other than tinting and shading: Just shade/tint/whatever	89	snippets:
94	your picture with gimp:
95		90
96	convert wallpaper.jpg -blur 20x20 -modulate 30 background.xpm	91	# Bourne/Korn/POSIX family of shells:
97	rxvt -pixmap background.xpm -pe automove-background	92	[ ${TERM:-foo} = foo ] && TERM=xterm # assume an xterm if we don't know
		93	if [ ${TERM:-foo} = xterm ]; then
		94	stty -icanon -echo min 0 time 15 # see if enhanced rxvt or not
		95	echo -n '^[Z'
		96	read term_id
		97	stty icanon echo
		98	if [ ""${term_id} = '^[[?1;2C' -a ${DISPLAY:-foo} = foo ]; then
		99	echo -n '^[[7n' # query the rxvt we are in for the DISPLAY string
		100	read DISPLAY # set it in our local shell
		101	fi
		102	fi
98		103
99	That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack XPM and Perl support, or	104	How do I compile the manual pages on my own?
100	you are unable to read.	105	You need to have a recent version of perl installed as /usr/bin/perl,
		106	one that comes with pod2man, pod2text and pod2xhtml (from Pod::Xhtml).
		107	Then go to the doc subdirectory and enter "make alldoc".
101		108
102	3. Use an ARGB visual:
103
104	rxvt -depth 32 -fg grey90 -bg rgba:0000/0000/4444/cccc
105
106	This requires XFT support, and the support of your X-server. If that
107	doesn't work for you, blame Xorg and Keith Packard. ARGB visuals aren't
108	there yet, no matter what they claim. Rxvt-Unicode contains the
109	neccessary bugfixes and workarounds for Xft and Xlib to make it work,
110	but that doesn't mean that your WM has the required kludges in place.
111
112	4. Use xcompmgr and let it do the job:
113
114	xprop -frame -f _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 32c \
115	-set _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 0xc0000000
116
117	Then click on a window you want to make transparent. Replace 0xc0000000
118	by other values to change the degree of opacity. If it doesn't work and
119	your server crashes, you got to keep the pieces.
120
121	Isn't rxvt supposed to be small? Don't all those features bloat?	109	Isn't rxvt-unicode supposed to be small? Don't all those features bloat?
122	I often get asked about this, and I think, no, they didn't cause extra	110	I often get asked about this, and I think, no, they didn't cause extra
123	bloat. If you compare a minimal rxvt and a minimal urxvt, you can see	111	bloat. If you compare a minimal rxvt and a minimal urxvt, you can see
124	that the urxvt binary is larger (due to some encoding tables always	112	that the urxvt binary is larger (due to some encoding tables always
125	being compiled in), but it actually uses less memory (RSS) after	113	being compiled in), but it actually uses less memory (RSS) after
126	startup. Even with "--disable-everything", this comparison is a bit	114	startup. Even with "--disable-everything", this comparison is a bit
…		…
129		117
130	text data bss drs rss filename	118	text data bss drs rss filename
131	98398 1664 24 15695 1824 rxvt --disable-everything	119	98398 1664 24 15695 1824 rxvt --disable-everything
132	188985 9048 66616 18222 1788 urxvt --disable-everything	120	188985 9048 66616 18222 1788 urxvt --disable-everything
133		121
134	When you "--enable-everything" (which _is_ unfair, as this involves xft	122	When you "--enable-everything" (which *is* unfair, as this involves xft
135	and full locale/XIM support which are quite bloaty inside libX11 and my	123	and full locale/XIM support which are quite bloaty inside libX11 and my
136	libc), the two diverge, but not unreasnobaly so.	124	libc), the two diverge, but not unreasonably so.
137		125
138	text data bss drs rss filename	126	text data bss drs rss filename
139	163431 2152 24 20123 2060 rxvt --enable-everything	127	163431 2152 24 20123 2060 rxvt --enable-everything
140	1035683 49680 66648 29096 3680 urxvt --enable-everything	128	1035683 49680 66648 29096 3680 urxvt --enable-everything
141		129
…		…
157	gnome-terminal (21152k + extra 4204k in separate processes) or konsole	145	gnome-terminal (21152k + extra 4204k in separate processes) or konsole
158	(22200k + extra 43180k in daemons that stay around after exit, plus half	146	(22200k + extra 43180k in daemons that stay around after exit, plus half
159	a minute of startup time, including the hundreds of warnings it spits	147	a minute of startup time, including the hundreds of warnings it spits
160	out), it fares extremely well *g*.	148	out), it fares extremely well *g*.
161		149
162	Why C++, isn't that unportable/bloated/uncool?	150	Why C++, isn't that unportable/bloated/uncool?
163	Is this a question? :) It comes up very often. The simple answer is: I	151	Is this a question? :) It comes up very often. The simple answer is: I
164	had to write it, and C++ allowed me to write and maintain it in a	152	had to write it, and C++ allowed me to write and maintain it in a
165	fraction of the time and effort (which is a scarce resource for me). Put	153	fraction of the time and effort (which is a scarce resource for me). Put
166	even shorter: It simply wouldn't exist without C++.	154	even shorter: It simply wouldn't exist without C++.
167		155
…		…
183		171
184	And here is rxvt-unicode:	172	And here is rxvt-unicode:
185		173
186	libX11.so.6 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00002aaaaabc3000)	174	libX11.so.6 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00002aaaaabc3000)
187	libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00002aaaaada2000)	175	libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00002aaaaada2000)
188	libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00002aaaaaeb0000)	176	libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00002aaaaaeb0000)
189	libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00002aaaab0ee000)	177	libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00002aaaab0ee000)
190	/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)	178	/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)
191		179
192	No large bloated libraries (of course, none were linked in statically),	180	No large bloated libraries (of course, none were linked in statically),
193	except maybe libX11 :)	181	except maybe libX11 :)
194		182
195	Does it support tabs, can I have a tabbed rxvt-unicode?	183	Rendering, Font & Look and Feel Issues
196	Beginning with version 7.3, there is a perl extension that implements a	184	I can't get transparency working, what am I doing wrong?
197	simple tabbed terminal. It is installed by default, so any of these	185	First of all, please address all transparency related issues to Sasha
198	should give you tabs:	186	Vasko at sasha@aftercode.net and do not bug the author about it. Also,
199		187	if you can't get it working consider it a rite of passage: ... and you
200	rxvt -pe tabbed
201
202	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,tabbed
203
204	It will also work fine with tabbing functionality of many window
205	managers or similar tabbing programs, and its embedding-features allow
206	it to be embedded into other programs, as witnessed by doc/rxvt-tabbed
207	or the upcoming "Gtk2::URxvt" perl module, which features a tabbed urxvt
208	(murxvt) terminal as an example embedding application.
209
210	How do I know which rxvt-unicode version I'm using?
211	The version number is displayed with the usage (-h). Also the escape
212	sequence "ESC [ 8 n" sets the window title to the version number. When
213	using the rxvtc client, the version displayed is that of the daemon.
214
215	I am using Debian GNU/Linux and have a problem...
216	The Debian GNU/Linux package of rxvt-unicode in sarge contains large
217	patches that considerably change the behaviour of rxvt-unicode (but
218	unfortunately this notice has been removed). Before reporting a bug to
219	the original rxvt-unicode author please download and install the genuine
220	version (<http://software.schmorp.de#rxvt-unicode>) and try to reproduce
221	the problem. If you cannot, chances are that the problems are specific
222	to Debian GNU/Linux, in which case it should be reported via the Debian
223	Bug Tracking System (use "reportbug" to report the bug).
224
225	For other problems that also affect the Debian package, you can and
226	probably should use the Debian BTS, too, because, after all, it's also a
227	bug in the Debian version and it serves as a reminder for other users
228	that might encounter the same issue.
229
230	I am maintaining rxvt-unicode for distribution/OS XXX, any
231	recommendation?
232	You should build one binary with the default options. configure now
233	enables most useful options, and the trend goes to making them
234	runtime-switchable, too, so there is usually no drawback to enbaling
235	them, except higher disk and possibly memory usage. The perl interpreter
236	should be enabled, as important functionality (menus, selection, likely
237	more in the future) depends on it.
238
239	You should not overwrite the "perl-ext-common" snd "perl-ext" resources
240	system-wide (except maybe with "defaults"). This will result in useful
241	behaviour. If your distribution aims at low memory, add an empty
242	"perl-ext-common" resource to the app-defaults file. This will keep the
243	perl interpreter disabled until the user enables it.
244
245	If you can/want build more binaries, I recommend building a minimal one
246	with "--disable-everything" (very useful) and a maximal one with
247	"--enable-everything" (less useful, it will be very big due to a lot of
248	encodings built-in that increase download times and are rarely used).
249
250	I need to make it setuid/setgid to support utmp/ptys on my OS, is this safe?
251	It should be, starting with release 7.1. You are encouraged to properly
252	install urxvt with privileges necessary for your OS now.
253
254	When rxvt-unicode detects that it runs setuid or setgid, it will fork
255	into a helper process for privileged operations (pty handling on some
256	systems, utmp/wtmp/lastlog handling on others) and drop privileges
257	immediately. This is much safer than most other terminals that keep
258	privileges while running (but is more relevant to urxvt, as it contains
259	things as perl interpreters, which might be "helpful" to attackers).
260
261	This forking is done as the very first within main(), which is very
262	early and reduces possible bugs to initialisation code run before
263	main(), or things like the dynamic loader of your system, which should
264	result in very little risk.
265
266	When I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?
267	The terminal description used by rxvt-unicode is not as widely available
268	as that for xterm, or even rxvt (for which the same problem often
269	arises).
270
271	The correct solution for this problem is to install the terminfo, this
272	can be done like this (with ncurses' infocmp):
273
274	REMOTE=remotesystem.domain
275	infocmp rxvt-unicode | ssh $REMOTE "cat >/tmp/ti && tic /tmp/ti"
276
277	... or by installing rxvt-unicode normally on the remote system,
278
279	If you cannot or do not want to do this, then you can simply set
280	"TERM=rxvt" or even "TERM=xterm", and live with the small number of
281	problems arising, which includes wrong keymapping, less and different
282	colours and some refresh errors in fullscreen applications. It's a nice
283	quick-and-dirty workaround for rare cases, though.
284
285	If you always want to do this (and are fine with the consequences) you
286	can either recompile rxvt-unicode with the desired TERM value or use a
287	resource to set it:
288
289	URxvt.termName: rxvt
290
291	If you don't plan to use rxvt (quite common...) you could also replace
292	the rxvt terminfo file with the rxvt-unicode one.
293
294	"tic" outputs some error when compiling the terminfo entry.
295	Most likely it's the empty definition for "enacs=". Just replace it by
296	"enacs=\E[0@" and try again.
297
298	"bash"'s readline does not work correctly under rxvt.
299	I need a termcap file entry.
300	One reason you might want this is that some distributions or operating
301	systems still compile some programs using the long-obsoleted termcap
302	library (Fedora Core's bash is one example) and rely on a termcap entry
303	for "rxvt-unicode".
304
305	You could use rxvt's termcap entry with resonable results in many cases.
306	You can also create a termcap entry by using terminfo's infocmp program
307	like this:
308
309	infocmp -C rxvt-unicode
310
311	Or you could use this termcap entry, generated by the command above:
312
313	rxvt-unicode|rxvt-unicode terminal (X Window System):\
314	:am:bw:eo:km:mi:ms:xn:xo:\
315	:co#80:it#8:li#24:lm#0:\
316	:AL=\E[%dL:DC=\E[%dP:DL=\E[%dM:DO=\E[%dB:IC=\E[%d@:\
317	:K1=\EOw:K2=\EOu:K3=\EOy:K4=\EOq:K5=\EOs:LE=\E[%dD:\
318	:RI=\E[%dC:SF=\E[%dS:SR=\E[%dT:UP=\E[%dA:ae=\E(B:al=\E[L:\
319	:as=\E(0:bl=^G:cd=\E[J:ce=\E[K:cl=\E[H\E[2J:\
320	:cm=\E[%i%d;%dH:cr=^M:cs=\E[%i%d;%dr:ct=\E[3g:dc=\E[P:\
321	:dl=\E[M:do=^J:ec=\E[%dX:ei=\E[4l:ho=\E[H:\
322	:i1=\E[?47l\E=\E[?1l:ic=\E[@:im=\E[4h:\
323	:is=\E[r\E[m\E[2J\E[H\E[?7h\E[?1;3;4;6l\E[4l:\
324	:k1=\E[11~:k2=\E[12~:k3=\E[13~:k4=\E[14~:k5=\E[15~:\
325	:k6=\E[17~:k7=\E[18~:k8=\E[19~:k9=\E[20~:kD=\E[3~:\
326	:kI=\E[2~:kN=\E[6~:kP=\E[5~:kb=\177:kd=\EOB:ke=\E[?1l\E>:\
327	:kh=\E[7~:kl=\EOD:kr=\EOC:ks=\E[?1h\E=:ku=\EOA:le=^H:\
328	:mb=\E[5m:md=\E[1m:me=\E[m\017:mr=\E[7m:nd=\E[C:rc=\E8:\
329	:sc=\E7:se=\E[27m:sf=^J:so=\E[7m:sr=\EM:st=\EH:ta=^I:\
330	:te=\E[r\E[?1049l:ti=\E[?1049h:ue=\E[24m:up=\E[A:\
331	:us=\E[4m:vb=\E[?5h\E[?5l:ve=\E[?25h:vi=\E[?25l:\
332	:vs=\E[?25h:
333
334	Why does "ls" no longer have coloured output?
335	The "ls" in the GNU coreutils unfortunately doesn't use terminfo to
336	decide wether a terminal has colour, but uses it's own configuration
337	file. Needless to say, "rxvt-unicode" is not in it's default file (among
338	with most other terminals supporting colour). Either add:
339
340	TERM rxvt-unicode
341
342	to "/etc/DIR_COLORS" or simply add:
343
344	alias ls='ls --color=auto'
345
346	to your ".profile" or ".bashrc".
347
348	Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. use the 88 colour mode?
349	Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. make use of italic?
350	Why are the secondary screen-related options not working properly?
351	Make sure you are using "TERM=rxvt-unicode". Some pre-packaged
352	distributions (most notably Debian GNU/Linux) break rxvt-unicode by
353	setting "TERM" to "rxvt", which doesn't have these extra features.
354	Unfortunately, some of these (most notably, again, Debian GNU/Linux)
355	furthermore fail to even install the "rxvt-unicode" terminfo file, so
356	you will need to install it on your own (See the question When I log-in
357	to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data? on how to do
358	this).
359
360	My numerical keypad acts weird and generates differing output?
361	Some Debian GNUL/Linux users seem to have this problem, although no
362	specific details were reported so far. It is possible that this is
363	caused by the wrong "TERM" setting, although the details of wether and
364	how this can happen are unknown, as "TERM=rxvt" should offer a
365	compatible keymap. See the answer to the previous question, and please
366	report if that helped.
367
368	Rxvt-unicode does not seem to understand the selected encoding?
369	Unicode does not seem to work?
370	If you encounter strange problems like typing an accented character but
371	getting two unrelated other characters or similar, or if program output
372	is subtly garbled, then you should check your locale settings.
373
374	Rxvt-unicode must be started with the same "LC_CTYPE" setting as the
375	programs. Often rxvt-unicode is started in the "C" locale, while the
376	login script running within the rxvt-unicode window changes the locale
377	to something else, e.g. "en_GB.UTF-8". Needless to say, this is not
378	going to work.
379
380	The best thing is to fix your startup environment, as you will likely
381	run into other problems. If nothing works you can try this in your
382	.profile.	188	failed.
383		189
384	printf '\e]701;%s\007' "$LC_CTYPE"	190	Here are four ways to get transparency. Do read the manpage and option
		191	descriptions for the programs mentioned and rxvt-unicode. Really, do it!
385		192
386	If this doesn't work, then maybe you use a "LC_CTYPE" specification not	193	1. Use transparent mode:
387	supported on your systems. Some systems have a "locale" command which
388	displays this (also, "perl -e0" can be used to check locale settings, as
389	it will complain loudly if it cannot set the locale). If it displays
390	something like:
391		194
392	locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: ...	195	Esetroot wallpaper.jpg
		196	urxvt -tr -tint red -sh 40
393		197
394	Then the locale you specified is not supported on your system.	198	That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack transparency and tinting
		199	support, or you are unable to read.
395		200
396	If nothing works and you are sure that everything is set correctly then	201	2. Use a simple pixmap and emulate pseudo-transparency. This enables you
397	you will need to remember a little known fact: Some programs just don't	202	to use effects other than tinting and shading: Just shade/tint/whatever
398	support locales :(	203	your picture with gimp or any other tool:
399		204
400	Why do some characters look so much different than others?	205	convert wallpaper.jpg -blur 20x20 -modulate 30 background.jpg
401	How does rxvt-unicode choose fonts?	206	urxvt -pixmap "background.jpg;:root"
402	Most fonts do not contain the full range of Unicode, which is fine.
403	Chances are that the font you (or the admin/package maintainer of your
404	system/os) have specified does not cover all the characters you want to
405	display.
406		207
407	rxvt-unicode makes a best-effort try at finding a replacement font.	208	That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack AfterImage support, or you
408	Often the result is fine, but sometimes the chosen font looks	209	are unable to read.
409	bad/ugly/wrong. Some fonts have totally strange characters that don't
410	resemble the correct glyph at all, and rxvt-unicode lacks the artificial
411	intelligence to detect that a specific glyph is wrong: it has to believe
412	the font that the characters it claims to contain indeed look correct.
413		210
414	In that case, select a font of your taste and add it to the font list,	211	3. Use an ARGB visual:
415	e.g.:
416		212
417	rxvt -fn basefont,font2,font3...	213	urxvt -depth 32 -fg grey90 -bg rgba:0000/0000/4444/cccc
418		214
419	When rxvt-unicode sees a character, it will first look at the base font.	215	This requires XFT support, and the support of your X-server. If that
420	If the base font does not contain the character, it will go to the next	216	doesn't work for you, blame Xorg and Keith Packard. ARGB visuals aren't
421	font, and so on. Specifying your own fonts will also speed up this	217	there yet, no matter what they claim. Rxvt-Unicode contains the
422	search and use less resources within rxvt-unicode and the X-server.	218	necessary bugfixes and workarounds for Xft and Xlib to make it work, but
		219	that doesn't mean that your WM has the required kludges in place.
423		220
424	The only limitation is that none of the fonts may be larger than the	221	4. Use xcompmgr and let it do the job:
425	base font, as the base font defines the terminal character cell size,
426	which must be the same due to the way terminals work.
427		222
428	Why do some chinese characters look so different than others?	223	xprop -frame -f _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 32c \
429	This is because there is a difference between script and language --	224	-set _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 0xc0000000
430	rxvt-unicode does not know which language the text that is output is, as
431	it only knows the unicode character codes. If rxvt-unicode first sees a
432	japanese/chinese character, it might choose a japanese font for display.
433	Subsequent japanese characters will use that font. Now, many chinese
434	characters aren't represented in japanese fonts, so when the first
435	non-japanese character comes up, rxvt-unicode will look for a chinese
436	font -- unfortunately at this point, it will still use the japanese font
437	for chinese characters that are also in the japanese font.
438		225
439	The workaround is easy: just tag a chinese font at the end of your font	226	Then click on a window you want to make transparent. Replace 0xc0000000
440	list (see the previous question). The key is to view the font list as a	227	by other values to change the degree of opacity. If it doesn't work and
441	preference list: If you expect more japanese, list a japanese font	228	your server crashes, you got to keep the pieces.
442	first. If you expect more chinese, put a chinese font first.
443		229
444	In the future it might be possible to switch language preferences at
445	runtime (the internal data structure has no problem with using different
446	fonts for the same character at the same time, but no interface for this
447	has been designed yet).
448
449	Until then, you might get away with switching fonts at runtime (see "Can
450	I switch the fonts at runtime?" later in this document).
451
452	Why does rxvt-unicode sometimes leave pixel droppings?	230	Why does rxvt-unicode sometimes leave pixel droppings?
453	Most fonts were not designed for terminal use, which means that	231	Most fonts were not designed for terminal use, which means that
454	character size varies a lot. A font that is otherwise fine for terminal	232	character size varies a lot. A font that is otherwise fine for terminal
455	use might contain some characters that are simply too wide. Rxvt-unicode	233	use might contain some characters that are simply too wide. Rxvt-unicode
456	will avoid these characters. For characters that are just "a bit" too	234	will avoid these characters. For characters that are just "a bit" too
457	wide a special "careful" rendering mode is used that redraws adjacent	235	wide a special "careful" rendering mode is used that redraws adjacent
…		…
461	however: Xft fonts often draw glyphs larger than their acclaimed	239	however: Xft fonts often draw glyphs larger than their acclaimed
462	bounding box, and rxvt-unicode has no way of detecting this (the correct	240	bounding box, and rxvt-unicode has no way of detecting this (the correct
463	way is to ask for the character bounding box, which unfortunately is	241	way is to ask for the character bounding box, which unfortunately is
464	wrong in these cases).	242	wrong in these cases).
465		243
466	It's not clear (to me at least), wether this is a bug in Xft, freetype,	244	It's not clear (to me at least), whether this is a bug in Xft, freetype,
467	or the respective font. If you encounter this problem you might try	245	or the respective font. If you encounter this problem you might try
468	using the "-lsp" option to give the font more height. If that doesn't	246	using the "-lsp" option to give the font more height. If that doesn't
469	work, you might be forced to use a different font.	247	work, you might be forced to use a different font.
470		248
471	All of this is not a problem when using X11 core fonts, as their	249	All of this is not a problem when using X11 core fonts, as their
472	bounding box data is correct.	250	bounding box data is correct.
473		251
474	On Solaris 9, many line-drawing characters are too wide.
475	Seems to be a known bug, read
476	<http://nixdoc.net/files/forum/about34198.html>. Some people use the
477	following ugly workaround to get non-double-wide-characters working:
478
479	#define wcwidth(x) wcwidth(x) > 1 ? 1 : wcwidth(x)
480
481	My Compose (Multi_key) key is no longer working.
482	The most common causes for this are that either your locale is not set
483	correctly, or you specified a preeditStyle that is not supported by your
484	input method. For example, if you specified OverTheSpot and your input
485	method (e.g. the default input method handling Compose keys) does not
486	support this (for instance because it is not visual), then rxvt-unicode
487	will continue without an input method.
488
489	In this case either do not specify a preeditStyle or specify more than
490	one pre-edit style, such as OverTheSpot,Root,None.
491
492	I cannot type "Ctrl-Shift-2" to get an ASCII NUL character due to ISO 14755
493	Either try "Ctrl-2" alone (it often is mapped to ASCII NUL even on
494	international keyboards) or simply use ISO 14755 support to your
495	advantage, typing <Ctrl-Shift-0> to get a ASCII NUL. This works for
496	other codes, too, such as "Ctrl-Shift-1-d" to type the default telnet
497	escape character and so on.
498
499	How can I keep rxvt-unicode from using reverse video so much?	252	How can I keep rxvt-unicode from using reverse video so much?
500	First of all, make sure you are running with the right terminal settings	253	First of all, make sure you are running with the right terminal settings
501	("TERM=rxvt-unicode"), which will get rid of most of these effects. Then	254	("TERM=rxvt-unicode"), which will get rid of most of these effects. Then
502	make sure you have specified colours for italic and bold, as otherwise	255	make sure you have specified colours for italic and bold, as otherwise
503	rxvt-unicode might use reverse video to simulate the effect:	256	rxvt-unicode might use reverse video to simulate the effect:
504		257
505	URxvt.colorBD: white	258	URxvt.colorBD: white
506	URxvt.colorIT: green	259	URxvt.colorIT: green
507		260
508	Some programs assume totally weird colours (red instead of blue), how can I fix that?	261	Some programs assume totally weird colours (red instead of blue), how can I fix that?
509	For some unexplainable reason, some rare programs assume a very weird	262	For some unexplainable reason, some rare programs assume a very weird
510	colour palette when confronted with a terminal with more than the	263	colour palette when confronted with a terminal with more than the
511	standard 8 colours (rxvt-unicode supports 88). The right fix is, of	264	standard 8 colours (rxvt-unicode supports 88). The right fix is, of
512	course, to fix these programs not to assume non-ISO colours without very	265	course, to fix these programs not to assume non-ISO colours without very
513	good reasons.	266	good reasons.
514		267
515	In the meantime, you can either edit your "rxvt-unicode" terminfo	268	In the meantime, you can either edit your "rxvt-unicode" terminfo
516	definition to only claim 8 colour support or use "TERM=rxvt", which will	269	definition to only claim 8 colour support or use "TERM=rxvt", which will
517	fix colours but keep you from using other rxvt-unicode features.	270	fix colours but keep you from using other rxvt-unicode features.
518		271
519	I am on FreeBSD and rxvt-unicode does not seem to work at all.
520	Rxvt-unicode requires the symbol "__STDC_ISO_10646__" to be defined in
521	your compile environment, or an implementation that implements it,
522	wether it defines the symbol or not. "__STDC_ISO_10646__" requires that
523	wchar_t is represented as unicode.
524
525	As you might have guessed, FreeBSD does neither define this symobl nor
526	does it support it. Instead, it uses it's own internal representation of
527	wchar_t. This is, of course, completely fine with respect to standards.
528
529	However, that means rxvt-unicode only works in "POSIX", "ISO-8859-1" and
530	"UTF-8" locales under FreeBSD (which all use Unicode as wchar_t.
531
532	"__STDC_ISO_10646__" is the only sane way to support multi-language apps
533	in an OS, as using a locale-dependent (and non-standardized)
534	representation of wchar_t makes it impossible to convert between wchar_t
535	(as used by X11 and your applications) and any other encoding without
536	implementing OS-specific-wrappers for each and every locale. There
537	simply are no APIs to convert wchar_t into anything except the current
538	locale encoding.
539
540	Some applications (such as the formidable mlterm) work around this by
541	carrying their own replacement functions for character set handling with
542	them, and either implementing OS-dependent hacks or doing multiple
543	conversions (which is slow and unreliable in case the OS implements
544	encodings slightly different than the terminal emulator).
545
546	The rxvt-unicode author insists that the right way to fix this is in the
547	system libraries once and for all, instead of forcing every app to carry
548	complete replacements for them :)
549
550	I use Solaris 9 and it doesn't compile/work/etc.
551	Try the diff in doc/solaris9.patch as a base. It fixes the worst
552	problems with "wcwidth" and a compile problem.
553
554	How can I use rxvt-unicode under cygwin?
555	rxvt-unicode should compile and run out of the box on cygwin, using the
556	X11 libraries that come with cygwin. libW11 emulation is no longer
557	supported (and makes no sense, either, as it only supported a single
558	font). I recommend starting the X-server in "-multiwindow" or
559	"-rootless" mode instead, which will result in similar look&feel as the
560	old libW11 emulation.
561
562	At the time of this writing, cygwin didn't seem to support any
563	multi-byte encodings (you might try "LC_CTYPE=C-UTF-8"), so you are
564	likely limited to 8-bit encodings.
565
566	How does rxvt-unicode determine the encoding to use?
567	Is there an option to switch encodings?
568	Unlike some other terminals, rxvt-unicode has no encoding switch, and no
569	specific "utf-8" mode, such as xterm. In fact, it doesn't even know
570	about UTF-8 or any other encodings with respect to terminal I/O.
571
572	The reasons is that there exists a perfectly fine mechanism for
573	selecting the encoding, doing I/O and (most important) communicating
574	this to all applications so everybody agrees on character properties
575	such as width and code number. This mechanism is the *locale*.
576	Applications not using that info will have problems (for example,
577	"xterm" gets the width of characters wrong as it uses it's own,
578	locale-independent table under all locales).
579
580	Rxvt-unicode uses the "LC_CTYPE" locale category to select encoding. All
581	programs doing the same (that is, most) will automatically agree in the
582	interpretation of characters.
583
584	Unfortunately, there is no system-independent way to select locales, nor
585	is there a standard on how locale specifiers will look like.
586
587	On most systems, the content of the "LC_CTYPE" environment variable
588	contains an arbitrary string which corresponds to an already-installed
589	locale. Common names for locales are "en_US.UTF-8", "de_DE.ISO-8859-15",
590	"ja_JP.EUC-JP", i.e. "language_country.encoding", but other forms (i.e.
591	"de" or "german") are also common.
592
593	Rxvt-unicode ignores all other locale categories, and except for the
594	encoding, ignores country or language-specific settings, i.e.
595	"de_DE.UTF-8" and "ja_JP.UTF-8" are the normally same to rxvt-unicode.
596
597	If you want to use a specific encoding you have to make sure you start
598	rxvt-unicode with the correct "LC_CTYPE" category.
599
600	Can I switch locales at runtime?
601	Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which sets
602	rxvt-unicode's idea of "LC_CTYPE".
603
604	printf '\e]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
605
606	See also the previous answer.
607
608	Sometimes this capability is rather handy when you want to work in one
609	locale (e.g. "de_DE.UTF-8") but some programs don't support it (e.g.
610	UTF-8). For example, I use this script to start "xjdic", which first
611	switches to a locale supported by xjdic and back later:
612
613	printf '\e]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
614	xjdic -js
615	printf '\e]701;%s\007' de_DE.UTF-8
616
617	You can also use xterm's "luit" program, which usually works fine,
618	except for some locales where character width differs between program-
619	and rxvt-unicode-locales.
620
621	Can I switch the fonts at runtime?	272	Can I switch the fonts at runtime?
622	Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which has the	273	Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which has the
623	same effect as using the "-fn" switch, and takes effect immediately:	274	same effect as using the "-fn" switch, and takes effect immediately:
624		275
625	printf '\e]50;%s\007' "9x15bold,xft:Kochi Gothic"	276	printf '\33]50;%s\007' "9x15bold,xft:Kochi Gothic"
626		277
627	This is useful if you e.g. work primarily with japanese (and prefer a	278	This is useful if you e.g. work primarily with japanese (and prefer a
628	japanese font), but you have to switch to chinese temporarily, where	279	japanese font), but you have to switch to chinese temporarily, where
629	japanese fonts would only be in your way.	280	japanese fonts would only be in your way.
630		281
631	You can think of this as a kind of manual ISO-2022 switching.	282	You can think of this as a kind of manual ISO-2022 switching.
632		283
633	Why do italic characters look as if clipped?	284	Why do italic characters look as if clipped?
634	Many fonts have difficulties with italic characters and hinting. For	285	Many fonts have difficulties with italic characters and hinting. For
635	example, the otherwise very nicely hinted font "xft:Bitstream Vera Sans	286	example, the otherwise very nicely hinted font "xft:Bitstream Vera Sans
636	Mono" completely fails in it's italic face. A workaround might be to	287	Mono" completely fails in its italic face. A workaround might be to
637	enable freetype autohinting, i.e. like this:	288	enable freetype autohinting, i.e. like this:
638		289
639	URxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true	290	URxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true
640	URxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true	291	URxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true
641		292
642	My input method wants <some encoding> but I want UTF-8, what can I do?
643	You can specify separate locales for the input method and the rest of
644	the terminal, using the resource "imlocale":
645
646	URxvt.imlocale: ja_JP.EUC-JP
647
648	Now you can start your terminal with "LC_CTYPE=ja_JP.UTF-8" and still
649	use your input method. Please note, however, that you will not be able
650	to input characters outside "EUC-JP" in a normal way then, as your input
651	method limits you.
652
653	Rxvt-unicode crashes when the X Input Method changes or exits.
654	Unfortunately, this is unavoidable, as the XIM protocol is racy by
655	design. Applications can avoid some crashes at the expense of memory
656	leaks, and Input Methods can avoid some crashes by careful ordering at
657	exit time. kinput2 (and derived input methods) generally succeeds, while
658	SCIM (or similar input methods) fails. In the end, however, crashes
659	cannot be completely avoided even if both sides cooperate.
660
661	So the only workaround is not to kill your Input Method Servers.
662
663	Rxvt-unicode uses gobs of memory, how can I reduce that?
664	Rxvt-unicode tries to obey the rule of not charging you for something
665	you don't use. One thing you should try is to configure out all settings
666	that you don't need, for example, Xft support is a resource hog by
667	design, when used. Compiling it out ensures that no Xft font will be
668	loaded accidentally when rxvt-unicode tries to find a font for your
669	characters.
670
671	Also, many people (me included) like large windows and even larger
672	scrollback buffers: Without "--enable-unicode3", rxvt-unicode will use 6
673	bytes per screen cell. For a 160x?? window this amounts to almost a
674	kilobyte per line. A scrollback buffer of 10000 lines will then (if
675	full) use 10 Megabytes of memory. With "--enable-unicode3" it gets
676	worse, as rxvt-unicode then uses 8 bytes per screen cell.
677
678	Can I speed up Xft rendering somehow?	293	Can I speed up Xft rendering somehow?
679	Yes, the most obvious way to speed it up is to avoid Xft entirely, as it	294	Yes, the most obvious way to speed it up is to avoid Xft entirely, as it
680	is simply slow. If you still want Xft fonts you might try to disable	295	is simply slow. If you still want Xft fonts you might try to disable
681	antialiasing (by appending ":antialias=false"), which saves lots of	296	antialiasing (by appending ":antialias=false"), which saves lots of
682	memory and also speeds up rendering considerably.	297	memory and also speeds up rendering considerably.
683		298
684	Rxvt-unicode doesn't seem to anti-alias its fonts, what is wrong?	299	Rxvt-unicode doesn't seem to anti-alias its fonts, what is wrong?
685	Rxvt-unicode will use whatever you specify as a font. If it needs to	300	Rxvt-unicode will use whatever you specify as a font. If it needs to
686	fall back to it's default font search list it will prefer X11 core	301	fall back to its default font search list it will prefer X11 core fonts,
687	fonts, because they are small and fast, and then use Xft fonts. It has	302	because they are small and fast, and then use Xft fonts. It has
688	antialiasing disabled for most of them, because the author thinks they	303	antialiasing disabled for most of them, because the author thinks they
689	look best that way.	304	look best that way.
690		305
691	If you want antialiasing, you have to specify the fonts manually.	306	If you want antialiasing, you have to specify the fonts manually.
692		307
693	Mouse cut/paste suddenly no longer works.
694	Make sure that mouse reporting is actually turned off since killing some
695	editors prematurely may leave the mouse in mouse report mode. I've heard
696	that tcsh may use mouse reporting unless it otherwise specified. A quick
697	check is to see if cut/paste works when the Alt or Shift keys are
698	depressed.
699
700	What's with this bold/blink stuff?	308	What's with this bold/blink stuff?
701	If no bold colour is set via "colorBD:", bold will invert text using the	309	If no bold colour is set via "colorBD:", bold will invert text using the
702	standard foreground colour.	310	standard foreground colour.
703		311
704	For the standard background colour, blinking will actually make the text	312	For the standard background colour, blinking will actually make the text
705	blink when compiled with "--enable-blinking". with standard colours.	313	blink when compiled with "--enable-text-blink". Without
706	Without "--enable-blinking", the blink attribute will be ignored.	314	"--enable-text-blink", the blink attribute will be ignored.
707		315
708	On ANSI colours, bold/blink attributes are used to set high-intensity	316	On ANSI colours, bold/blink attributes are used to set high-intensity
709	foreground/background colors.	317	foreground/background colors.
710		318
711	color0-7 are the low-intensity colors.	319	color0-7 are the low-intensity colors.
712		320
713	color8-15 are the corresponding high-intensity colors.	321	color8-15 are the corresponding high-intensity colors.
714		322
715	I don't like the screen colors. How do I change them?	323	I don't like the screen colors. How do I change them?
716	You can change the screen colors at run-time using ~/.Xdefaults	324	You can change the screen colors at run-time using ~/.Xdefaults
717	resources (or as long-options).	325	resources (or as long-options).
718		326
719	Here are values that are supposed to resemble a VGA screen, including	327	Here are values that are supposed to resemble a VGA screen, including
720	the murky brown that passes for low-intensity yellow:	328	the murky brown that passes for low-intensity yellow:
…		…
735	URxvt.color12: #0000FF	343	URxvt.color12: #0000FF
736	URxvt.color13: #FF00FF	344	URxvt.color13: #FF00FF
737	URxvt.color14: #00FFFF	345	URxvt.color14: #00FFFF
738	URxvt.color15: #FFFFFF	346	URxvt.color15: #FFFFFF
739		347
740	And here is a more complete set of non-standard colors described (not by	348	And here is a more complete set of non-standard colors.
741	me) as "pretty girly".
742		349
743	URxvt.cursorColor: #dc74d1	350	URxvt.cursorColor: #dc74d1
744	URxvt.pointerColor: #dc74d1	351	URxvt.pointerColor: #dc74d1
745	URxvt.background: #0e0e0e	352	URxvt.background: #0e0e0e
746	URxvt.foreground: #4ad5e1	353	URxvt.foreground: #4ad5e1
…		…
757	URxvt.color6: #73f7ff	364	URxvt.color6: #73f7ff
758	URxvt.color14: #73f7ff	365	URxvt.color14: #73f7ff
759	URxvt.color7: #e1dddd	366	URxvt.color7: #e1dddd
760	URxvt.color15: #e1dddd	367	URxvt.color15: #e1dddd
761		368
762	How can I start rxvtd in a race-free way?	369	They have been described (not by me) as "pretty girly".
763	Try "rxvtd -f -o", which tells rxvtd to open the display, create the
764	listening socket and then fork.
765		370
		371	Why do some characters look so much different than others?
		372	See next entry.
		373
		374	How does rxvt-unicode choose fonts?
		375	Most fonts do not contain the full range of Unicode, which is fine.
		376	Chances are that the font you (or the admin/package maintainer of your
		377	system/os) have specified does not cover all the characters you want to
		378	display.
		379
		380	rxvt-unicode makes a best-effort try at finding a replacement font.
		381	Often the result is fine, but sometimes the chosen font looks
		382	bad/ugly/wrong. Some fonts have totally strange characters that don't
		383	resemble the correct glyph at all, and rxvt-unicode lacks the artificial
		384	intelligence to detect that a specific glyph is wrong: it has to believe
		385	the font that the characters it claims to contain indeed look correct.
		386
		387	In that case, select a font of your taste and add it to the font list,
		388	e.g.:
		389
		390	urxvt -fn basefont,font2,font3...
		391
		392	When rxvt-unicode sees a character, it will first look at the base font.
		393	If the base font does not contain the character, it will go to the next
		394	font, and so on. Specifying your own fonts will also speed up this
		395	search and use less resources within rxvt-unicode and the X-server.
		396
		397	The only limitation is that none of the fonts may be larger than the
		398	base font, as the base font defines the terminal character cell size,
		399	which must be the same due to the way terminals work.
		400
		401	Why do some chinese characters look so different than others?
		402	This is because there is a difference between script and language --
		403	rxvt-unicode does not know which language the text that is output is, as
		404	it only knows the unicode character codes. If rxvt-unicode first sees a
		405	japanese/chinese character, it might choose a japanese font for display.
		406	Subsequent japanese characters will use that font. Now, many chinese
		407	characters aren't represented in japanese fonts, so when the first
		408	non-japanese character comes up, rxvt-unicode will look for a chinese
		409	font -- unfortunately at this point, it will still use the japanese font
		410	for chinese characters that are also in the japanese font.
		411
		412	The workaround is easy: just tag a chinese font at the end of your font
		413	list (see the previous question). The key is to view the font list as a
		414	preference list: If you expect more japanese, list a japanese font
		415	first. If you expect more chinese, put a chinese font first.
		416
		417	In the future it might be possible to switch language preferences at
		418	runtime (the internal data structure has no problem with using different
		419	fonts for the same character at the same time, but no interface for this
		420	has been designed yet).
		421
		422	Until then, you might get away with switching fonts at runtime (see "Can
		423	I switch the fonts at runtime?" later in this document).
		424
		425	How can I make mplayer display video correctly?
		426	We are working on it, in the meantime, as a workaround, use something
		427	like:
		428
		429	urxvt -b 600 -geometry 20x1 -e sh -c 'mplayer -wid $WINDOWID file...'
		430
		431	Keyboard, Mouse & User Interaction
		432	The new selection selects pieces that are too big, how can I select single words?
		433	If you want to select e.g. alphanumeric words, you can use the following
		434	setting:
		435
		436	URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([[:word:]]+)
		437
		438	If you click more than twice, the selection will be extended more and
		439	more.
		440
		441	To get a selection that is very similar to the old code, try this
		442	pattern:
		443
		444	URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([^"&'()*,;<=>?@[\\\\]^`{|})]+)
		445
		446	Please also note that the *LeftClick Shift-LeftClick* combination also
		447	selects words like the old code.
		448
		449	I don't like the new selection/popups/hotkeys/perl, how do I change/disable it?
		450	You can disable the perl extension completely by setting the
		451	perl-ext-common resource to the empty string, which also keeps
		452	rxvt-unicode from initialising perl, saving memory.
		453
		454	If you only want to disable specific features, you first have to
		455	identify which perl extension is responsible. For this, read the section
		456	PREPACKAGED EXTENSIONS in the urxvtperl(3) manpage. For example, to
		457	disable the selection-popup and option-popup, specify this
		458	perl-ext-common resource:
		459
		460	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-selection-popup,-option-popup
		461
		462	This will keep the default extensions, but disable the two popup
		463	extensions. Some extensions can also be configured, for example,
		464	scrollback search mode is triggered by M-s. You can move it to any other
		465	combination either by setting the searchable-scrollback resource:
		466
		467	URxvt.searchable-scrollback: CM-s
		468
		469	The cursor moves when selecting text in the current input line, how do I switch this off?
		470	See next entry.
		471
		472	During rlogin/ssh/telnet/etc. sessions, clicking near the cursor outputs strange escape sequences, how do I fix this?
		473	These are caused by the "readline" perl extension. Under normal
		474	circumstances, it will move your cursor around when you click into the
		475	line that contains it. It tries hard not to do this at the wrong moment,
		476	but when running a program that doesn't parse cursor movements or in
		477	some cases during rlogin sessions, it fails to detect this properly.
		478
		479	You can permanently switch this feature off by disabling the "readline"
		480	extension:
		481
		482	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-readline
		483
		484	My numerical keypad acts weird and generates differing output?
		485	Some Debian GNUL/Linux users seem to have this problem, although no
		486	specific details were reported so far. It is possible that this is
		487	caused by the wrong "TERM" setting, although the details of whether and
		488	how this can happen are unknown, as "TERM=rxvt" should offer a
		489	compatible keymap. See the answer to the previous question, and please
		490	report if that helped.
		491
		492	My Compose (Multi_key) key is no longer working.
		493	The most common causes for this are that either your locale is not set
		494	correctly, or you specified a preeditStyle that is not supported by your
		495	input method. For example, if you specified OverTheSpot and your input
		496	method (e.g. the default input method handling Compose keys) does not
		497	support this (for instance because it is not visual), then rxvt-unicode
		498	will continue without an input method.
		499
		500	In this case either do not specify a preeditStyle or specify more than
		501	one pre-edit style, such as OverTheSpot,Root,None.
		502
		503	If it still doesn't work, then maybe your input method doesn't support
		504	compose sequences - to fall back to the built-in one, make sure you
		505	don't specify an input method via "-im" or "XMODIFIERS".
		506
		507	I cannot type "Ctrl-Shift-2" to get an ASCII NUL character due to ISO 14755
		508	Either try "Ctrl-2" alone (it often is mapped to ASCII NUL even on
		509	international keyboards) or simply use ISO 14755 support to your
		510	advantage, typing <Ctrl-Shift-0> to get a ASCII NUL. This works for
		511	other codes, too, such as "Ctrl-Shift-1-d" to type the default telnet
		512	escape character and so on.
		513
		514	Mouse cut/paste suddenly no longer works.
		515	Make sure that mouse reporting is actually turned off since killing some
		516	editors prematurely may leave the mouse in mouse report mode. I've heard
		517	that tcsh may use mouse reporting unless it otherwise specified. A quick
		518	check is to see if cut/paste works when the Alt or Shift keys are
		519	depressed.
		520
766	What's with the strange Backspace/Delete key behaviour?	521	What's with the strange Backspace/Delete key behaviour?
767	Assuming that the physical Backspace key corresponds to the BackSpace	522	Assuming that the physical Backspace key corresponds to the Backspace
768	keysym (not likely for Linux ... see the following question) there are	523	keysym (not likely for Linux ... see the following question) there are
769	two standard values that can be used for Backspace: "^H" and "^?".	524	two standard values that can be used for Backspace: "^H" and "^?".
770		525
771	Historically, either value is correct, but rxvt-unicode adopts the	526	Historically, either value is correct, but rxvt-unicode adopts the
772	debian policy of using "^?" when unsure, because it's the one only only	527	debian policy of using "^?" when unsure, because it's the one and only
773	correct choice :).	528	correct choice :).
774		529
775	Rxvt-unicode tries to inherit the current stty settings and uses the	530	Rxvt-unicode tries to inherit the current stty settings and uses the
776	value of `erase' to guess the value for backspace. If rxvt-unicode	531	value of `erase' to guess the value for backspace. If rxvt-unicode
777	wasn't started from a terminal (say, from a menu or by remote shell),	532	wasn't started from a terminal (say, from a menu or by remote shell),
…		…
781		536
782	For starting a new rxvt-unicode:	537	For starting a new rxvt-unicode:
783		538
784	# use Backspace = ^H	539	# use Backspace = ^H
785	$ stty erase ^H	540	$ stty erase ^H
786	$ rxvt	541	$ urxvt
787		542
788	# use Backspace = ^?	543	# use Backspace = ^?
789	$ stty erase ^?	544	$ stty erase ^?
790	$ rxvt	545	$ urxvt
791		546
792	Toggle with "ESC [ 36 h" / "ESC [ 36 l".	547	Toggle with "ESC [ 36 h" / "ESC [ 36 l".
793		548
794	For an existing rxvt-unicode:	549	For an existing rxvt-unicode:
795		550
…		…
815	some editors use termcap/terminfo, some editors (vim I'm told) expect	570	some editors use termcap/terminfo, some editors (vim I'm told) expect
816	Backspace = ^H, GNU Emacs (and Emacs-like editors) use ^H for help.	571	Backspace = ^H, GNU Emacs (and Emacs-like editors) use ^H for help.
817		572
818	Perhaps someday this will all be resolved in a consistent manner.	573	Perhaps someday this will all be resolved in a consistent manner.
819		574
820	I don't like the key-bindings. How do I change them?	575	I don't like the key-bindings. How do I change them?
821	There are some compile-time selections available via configure. Unless	576	There are some compile-time selections available via configure. Unless
822	you have run "configure" with the "--disable-resources" option you can	577	you have run "configure" with the "--disable-resources" option you can
823	use the `keysym' resource to alter the keystrings associated with	578	use the `keysym' resource to alter the keystrings associated with
824	keysyms.	579	keysyms.
825		580
826	Here's an example for a URxvt session started using "rxvt -name URxvt"	581	Here's an example for a URxvt session started using "urxvt -name URxvt"
827		582
828	URxvt.keysym.Home: \033[1~	583	URxvt.keysym.Home: \033[1~
829	URxvt.keysym.End: \033[4~	584	URxvt.keysym.End: \033[4~
830	URxvt.keysym.C-apostrophe: \033<C-'>	585	URxvt.keysym.C-apostrophe: \033<C-'>
831	URxvt.keysym.C-slash: \033<C-/>	586	URxvt.keysym.C-slash: \033<C-/>
…		…
846	URxvt.keysym.M-C-a: list \033<M-C- abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz >	601	URxvt.keysym.M-C-a: list \033<M-C- abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz >
847	URxvt.keysym.F12: command:\033]701;zh_CN.GBK\007	602	URxvt.keysym.F12: command:\033]701;zh_CN.GBK\007
848		603
849	See some more examples in the documentation for the keysym resource.	604	See some more examples in the documentation for the keysym resource.
850		605
851	I'm using keyboard model XXX that has extra Prior/Next/Insert keys.	606	I'm using keyboard model XXX that has extra Prior/Next/Insert keys. How do I make use of them? For example, the Sun Keyboard type 4 has the following map
852	How do I make use of them? For example, the Sun Keyboard type 4
853	has the following mappings that rxvt-unicode doesn't recognize.
854	KP_Insert == Insert	607	KP_Insert == Insert
855	F22 == Print	608	F22 == Print
856	F27 == Home	609	F27 == Home
857	F29 == Prior	610	F29 == Prior
858	F33 == End	611	F33 == End
…		…
860		613
861	Rather than have rxvt-unicode try to accommodate all the various	614	Rather than have rxvt-unicode try to accommodate all the various
862	possible keyboard mappings, it is better to use `xmodmap' to remap the	615	possible keyboard mappings, it is better to use `xmodmap' to remap the
863	keys as required for your particular machine.	616	keys as required for your particular machine.
864		617
865	How do I distinguish wether I'm running rxvt-unicode or a regular xterm?	618	Terminal Configuration
866	I need this to decide about setting colors etc.	619	Can I see a typical configuration?
867	rxvt and rxvt-unicode always export the variable "COLORTERM", so you can	620	The default configuration tries to be xterm-like, which I don't like
868	check and see if that is set. Note that several programs, JED, slrn,	621	that much, but it's least surprise to regular users.
869	Midnight Commander automatically check this variable to decide whether
870	or not to use color.
871		622
872	How do I set the correct, full IP address for the DISPLAY variable?	623	As a rxvt or rxvt-unicode user, you are practically supposed to invest
873	If you've compiled rxvt-unicode with DISPLAY_IS_IP and have enabled	624	time into customising your terminal. To get you started, here is the
874	insecure mode then it is possible to use the following shell script	625	author's .Xdefaults entries, with comments on what they do. It's
875	snippets to correctly set the display. If your version of rxvt-unicode	626	certainly not *typical*, but what's typical...
876	wasn't also compiled with ESCZ_ANSWER (as assumed in these snippets)
877	then the COLORTERM variable can be used to distinguish rxvt-unicode from
878	a regular xterm.
879		627
880	Courtesy of Chuck Blake <cblake@BBN.COM> with the following shell script	628	URxvt.cutchars: "()*,<>[]{}|'
881	snippets:	629	URxvt.print-pipe: cat >/tmp/xxx
882		630
883	# Bourne/Korn/POSIX family of shells:	631	These are just for testing stuff.
884	[ ${TERM:-foo} = foo ] && TERM=xterm # assume an xterm if we don't know
885	if [ ${TERM:-foo} = xterm ]; then
886	stty -icanon -echo min 0 time 15 # see if enhanced rxvt or not
887	echo -n '^[Z'
888	read term_id
889	stty icanon echo
890	if [ ""${term_id} = '^[[?1;2C' -a ${DISPLAY:-foo} = foo ]; then
891	echo -n '^[[7n' # query the rxvt we are in for the DISPLAY string
892	read DISPLAY # set it in our local shell
893	fi
894	fi
895		632
896	How do I compile the manual pages for myself?	633	URxvt.imLocale: ja_JP.UTF-8
897	You need to have a recent version of perl installed as /usr/bin/perl,	634	URxvt.preeditType: OnTheSpot,None
898	one that comes with pod2man, pod2text and pod2html. Then go to the doc
899	subdirectory and enter "make alldoc".
900		635
901	My question isn't answered here, can I ask a human?	636	This tells rxvt-unicode to use a special locale when communicating with
902	Before sending me mail, you could go to IRC: "irc.freenode.net", channel	637	the X Input Method, and also tells it to only use the OnTheSpot pre-edit
903	"#rxvt-unicode" has some rxvt-unicode enthusiasts that might be	638	type, which requires the "xim-onthespot" perl extension but rewards me
904	interested in learning about new and exciting problems (but not FAQs :).	639	with correct-looking fonts.
905		640
		641	URxvt.perl-lib: /root/lib/urxvt
		642	URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,selection-autotransform,selection-pastebin,xim-onthespot,remote-clipboard
		643	URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ( at .*? line \\d+)
		644	URxvt.selection.pattern-1: ^(/[^:]+):\
		645	URxvt.selection-autotransform.0: s/^([^:[:space:]]+):(\\d+):?$/:e \\Q$1\\E\\x0d:$2\\x0d/
		646	URxvt.selection-autotransform.1: s/^ at (.*?) line (\\d+)$/:e \\Q$1\\E\\x0d:$2\\x0d/
		647
		648	This is my perl configuration. The first two set the perl library
		649	directory and also tells urxvt to use a large number of extensions. I
		650	develop for myself mostly, so I actually use most of the extensions I
		651	write.
		652
		653	The selection stuff mainly makes the selection perl-error-message aware
		654	and tells it to convert perl error messages into vi-commands to load the
		655	relevant file and go tot he error line number.
		656
		657	URxvt.scrollstyle: plain
		658	URxvt.secondaryScroll: true
		659
		660	As the documentation says: plain is the preferred scrollbar for the
		661	author. The "secondaryScroll" configures urxvt to scroll in full-screen
		662	apps, like screen, so lines scrolled out of screen end up in urxvt's
		663	scrollback buffer.
		664
		665	URxvt.background: #000000
		666	URxvt.foreground: gray90
		667	URxvt.color7: gray90
		668	URxvt.colorBD: #ffffff
		669	URxvt.cursorColor: #e0e080
		670	URxvt.throughColor: #8080f0
		671	URxvt.highlightColor: #f0f0f0
		672
		673	Some colours. Not sure which ones are being used or even non-defaults,
		674	but these are in my .Xdefaults. Most notably, they set
		675	foreground/background to light gray/black, and also make sure that the
		676	colour 7 matches the default foreground colour.
		677
		678	URxvt.underlineColor: yellow
		679
		680	Another colour, makes underline lines look different. Sometimes hurts,
		681	but is mostly a nice effect.
		682
		683	URxvt.geometry: 154x36
		684	URxvt.loginShell: false
		685	URxvt.meta: ignore
		686	URxvt.utmpInhibit: true
		687
		688	Uh, well, should be mostly self-explanatory. By specifying some defaults
		689	manually, I can quickly switch them for testing.
		690
		691	URxvt.saveLines: 8192
		692
		693	A large scrollback buffer is essential. Really.
		694
		695	URxvt.mapAlert: true
		696
		697	The only case I use it is for my IRC window, which I like to keep
		698	iconified till people msg me (which beeps).
		699
		700	URxvt.visualBell: true
		701
		702	The audible bell is often annoying, especially when in a crowd.
		703
		704	URxvt.insecure: true
		705
		706	Please don't hack my mutt! Ooops...
		707
		708	URxvt.pastableTabs: false
		709
		710	I once thought this is a great idea.
		711
		712	urxvt.font: 9x15bold,\
		713	-misc-fixed-bold-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1,\
		714	-misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1, \
		715	[codeset=JISX0208]xft:Kochi Gothic, \
		716	xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:autohint=true, \
		717	xft:Code2000:antialias=false
		718	urxvt.boldFont: -xos4-terminus-bold-r-normal--14-140-72-72-c-80-iso8859-15
		719	urxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true
		720	urxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true
		721
		722	I wrote rxvt-unicode to be able to specify fonts exactly. So don't be
		723	overwhelmed. A special note: the "9x15bold" mentioned above is actually
		724	the version from XFree-3.3, as XFree-4 replaced it by a totally
		725	different font (different glyphs for ";" and many other harmless
		726	characters), while the second font is actually the "9x15bold" from
		727	XFree4/XOrg. The bold version has less chars than the medium version, so
		728	I use it for rare characters, too. When editing sources with vim, I use
		729	italic for comments and other stuff, which looks quite good with
		730	Bitstream Vera anti-aliased.
		731
		732	Terminus is a quite bad font (many very wrong glyphs), but for most of
		733	my purposes, it works, and gives a different look, as my normal
		734	(Non-bold) font is already bold, and I want to see a difference between
		735	bold and normal fonts.
		736
		737	Please note that I used the "urxvt" instance name and not the "URxvt"
		738	class name. Thats because I use different configs for different
		739	purposes, for example, my IRC window is started with "-name IRC", and
		740	uses these defaults:
		741
		742	IRC*title: IRC
		743	IRC*geometry: 87x12+535+542
		744	IRC*saveLines: 0
		745	IRC*mapAlert: true
		746	IRC*font: suxuseuro
		747	IRC*boldFont: suxuseuro
		748	IRC*colorBD: white
		749	IRC*keysym.M-C-1: command:\033]710;suxuseuro\007\033]711;suxuseuro\007
		750	IRC*keysym.M-C-2: command:\033]710;9x15bold\007\033]711;9x15bold\007
		751
		752	"Alt-Ctrl-1" and "Alt-Ctrl-2" switch between two different font sizes.
		753	"suxuseuro" allows me to keep an eye (and actually read) stuff while
		754	keeping a very small window. If somebody pastes something complicated
		755	(e.g. japanese), I temporarily switch to a larger font.
		756
		757	The above is all in my ".Xdefaults" (I don't use ".Xresources" nor
		758	"xrdb"). I also have some resources in a separate ".Xdefaults-hostname"
		759	file for different hosts, for example, on ym main desktop, I use:
		760
		761	URxvt.keysym.C-M-q: command:\033[3;5;5t
		762	URxvt.keysym.C-M-y: command:\033[3;5;606t
		763	URxvt.keysym.C-M-e: command:\033[3;1605;5t
		764	URxvt.keysym.C-M-c: command:\033[3;1605;606t
		765	URxvt.keysym.C-M-p: perl:test
		766
		767	The first for keysym definitions allow me to quickly bring some windows
		768	in the layout I like most. Ion users might start laughing but will stop
		769	immediately when I tell them that I use my own Fvwm2 module for much the
		770	same effect as Ion provides, and I only very rarely use the above key
		771	combinations :->
		772
		773	Why doesn't rxvt-unicode read my resources?
		774	Well, why, indeed? It does, in a way very similar to other X
		775	applications. Most importantly, this means that if you or your OS loads
		776	resources into the X display (the right way to do it), rxvt-unicode will
		777	ignore any resource files in your home directory. It will only read
		778	$HOME/.Xdefaults when no resources are attached to the display.
		779
		780	If you have or use an $HOME/.Xresources file, chances are that resources
		781	are loaded into your X-server. In this case, you have to re-login after
		782	every change (or run xrdb -merge $HOME/.Xresources).
		783
		784	Also consider the form resources have to use:
		785
		786	URxvt.resource: value
		787
		788	If you want to use another form (there are lots of different ways of
		789	specifying resources), make sure you understand whether and why it
		790	works. If unsure, use the form above.
		791
		792	When I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?
		793	The terminal description used by rxvt-unicode is not as widely available
		794	as that for xterm, or even rxvt (for which the same problem often
		795	arises).
		796
		797	The correct solution for this problem is to install the terminfo, this
		798	can be done by simply installing rxvt-unicode on the remote system as
		799	well (in case you have a nice package manager ready), or you can install
		800	the terminfo database manually like this (with ncurses infocmp. works as
		801	user and root):
		802
		803	REMOTE=remotesystem.domain
		804	infocmp rxvt-unicode | ssh $REMOTE "mkdir -p .terminfo && cat >/tmp/ti && tic /tmp/ti"
		805
		806	One some systems you might need to set $TERMINFO to the full path of
		807	$HOME/.terminfo for this to work.
		808
		809	If you cannot or do not want to do this, then you can simply set
		810	"TERM=rxvt" or even "TERM=xterm", and live with the small number of
		811	problems arising, which includes wrong keymapping, less and different
		812	colours and some refresh errors in fullscreen applications. It's a nice
		813	quick-and-dirty workaround for rare cases, though.
		814
		815	If you always want to do this (and are fine with the consequences) you
		816	can either recompile rxvt-unicode with the desired TERM value or use a
		817	resource to set it:
		818
		819	URxvt.termName: rxvt
		820
		821	If you don't plan to use rxvt (quite common...) you could also replace
		822	the rxvt terminfo file with the rxvt-unicode one and use "TERM=rxvt".
		823
		824	nano fails with "Error opening terminal: rxvt-unicode"
		825	This exceptionally confusing and useless error message is printed by
		826	nano when it can't find the terminfo database. Nothing is wrong with
		827	your terminal, read the previous answer for a solution.
		828
		829	"tic" outputs some error when compiling the terminfo entry.
		830	Most likely it's the empty definition for "enacs=". Just replace it by
		831	"enacs=\E[0@" and try again.
		832
		833	"bash"'s readline does not work correctly under urxvt.
		834	See next entry.
		835
		836	I need a termcap file entry.
		837	One reason you might want this is that some distributions or operating
		838	systems still compile some programs using the long-obsoleted termcap
		839	library (Fedora Core's bash is one example) and rely on a termcap entry
		840	for "rxvt-unicode".
		841
		842	You could use rxvt's termcap entry with reasonable results in many
		843	cases. You can also create a termcap entry by using terminfo's infocmp
		844	program like this:
		845
		846	infocmp -C rxvt-unicode
		847
		848	Or you could use the termcap entry in doc/etc/rxvt-unicode.termcap,
		849	generated by the command above.
		850
		851	Why does "ls" no longer have coloured output?
		852	The "ls" in the GNU coreutils unfortunately doesn't use terminfo to
		853	decide whether a terminal has colour, but uses its own configuration
		854	file. Needless to say, "rxvt-unicode" is not in its default file (among
		855	with most other terminals supporting colour). Either add:
		856
		857	TERM rxvt-unicode
		858
		859	to "/etc/DIR_COLORS" or simply add:
		860
		861	alias ls='ls --color=auto'
		862
		863	to your ".profile" or ".bashrc".
		864
		865	Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. use the 88 colour mode?
		866	See next entry.
		867
		868	Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. make use of italic?
		869	See next entry.
		870
		871	Why are the secondary screen-related options not working properly?
		872	Make sure you are using "TERM=rxvt-unicode". Some pre-packaged
		873	distributions (most notably Debian GNU/Linux) break rxvt-unicode by
		874	setting "TERM" to "rxvt", which doesn't have these extra features.
		875	Unfortunately, some of these (most notably, again, Debian GNU/Linux)
		876	furthermore fail to even install the "rxvt-unicode" terminfo file, so
		877	you will need to install it on your own (See the question When I log-in
		878	to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data? on how to do
		879	this).
		880
		881	Encoding / Locale / Input Method Issues
		882	Rxvt-unicode does not seem to understand the selected encoding?
		883	See next entry.
		884
		885	Unicode does not seem to work?
		886	If you encounter strange problems like typing an accented character but
		887	getting two unrelated other characters or similar, or if program output
		888	is subtly garbled, then you should check your locale settings.
		889
		890	Rxvt-unicode must be started with the same "LC_CTYPE" setting as the
		891	programs running in it. Often rxvt-unicode is started in the "C" locale,
		892	while the login script running within the rxvt-unicode window changes
		893	the locale to something else, e.g. "en_GB.UTF-8". Needless to say, this
		894	is not going to work, and is the most common cause for problems.
		895
		896	The best thing is to fix your startup environment, as you will likely
		897	run into other problems. If nothing works you can try this in your
		898	.profile.
		899
		900	printf '\33]701;%s\007' "$LC_CTYPE" # $LANG or $LC_ALL are worth a try, too
		901
		902	If this doesn't work, then maybe you use a "LC_CTYPE" specification not
		903	supported on your systems. Some systems have a "locale" command which
		904	displays this (also, "perl -e0" can be used to check locale settings, as
		905	it will complain loudly if it cannot set the locale). If it displays
		906	something like:
		907
		908	locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: ...
		909
		910	Then the locale you specified is not supported on your system.
		911
		912	If nothing works and you are sure that everything is set correctly then
		913	you will need to remember a little known fact: Some programs just don't
		914	support locales :(
		915
		916	How does rxvt-unicode determine the encoding to use?
		917	See next entry.
		918
		919	Is there an option to switch encodings?
		920	Unlike some other terminals, rxvt-unicode has no encoding switch, and no
		921	specific "utf-8" mode, such as xterm. In fact, it doesn't even know
		922	about UTF-8 or any other encodings with respect to terminal I/O.
		923
		924	The reasons is that there exists a perfectly fine mechanism for
		925	selecting the encoding, doing I/O and (most important) communicating
		926	this to all applications so everybody agrees on character properties
		927	such as width and code number. This mechanism is the *locale*.
		928	Applications not using that info will have problems (for example,
		929	"xterm" gets the width of characters wrong as it uses its own,
		930	locale-independent table under all locales).
		931
		932	Rxvt-unicode uses the "LC_CTYPE" locale category to select encoding. All
		933	programs doing the same (that is, most) will automatically agree in the
		934	interpretation of characters.
		935
		936	Unfortunately, there is no system-independent way to select locales, nor
		937	is there a standard on how locale specifiers will look like.
		938
		939	On most systems, the content of the "LC_CTYPE" environment variable
		940	contains an arbitrary string which corresponds to an already-installed
		941	locale. Common names for locales are "en_US.UTF-8", "de_DE.ISO-8859-15",
		942	"ja_JP.EUC-JP", i.e. "language_country.encoding", but other forms (i.e.
		943	"de" or "german") are also common.
		944
		945	Rxvt-unicode ignores all other locale categories, and except for the
		946	encoding, ignores country or language-specific settings, i.e.
		947	"de_DE.UTF-8" and "ja_JP.UTF-8" are the normally same to rxvt-unicode.
		948
		949	If you want to use a specific encoding you have to make sure you start
		950	rxvt-unicode with the correct "LC_CTYPE" category.
		951
		952	Can I switch locales at runtime?
		953	Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which sets
		954	rxvt-unicode's idea of "LC_CTYPE".
		955
		956	printf '\33]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
		957
		958	See also the previous answer.
		959
		960	Sometimes this capability is rather handy when you want to work in one
		961	locale (e.g. "de_DE.UTF-8") but some programs don't support it (e.g.
		962	UTF-8). For example, I use this script to start "xjdic", which first
		963	switches to a locale supported by xjdic and back later:
		964
		965	printf '\33]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
		966	xjdic -js
		967	printf '\33]701;%s\007' de_DE.UTF-8
		968
		969	You can also use xterm's "luit" program, which usually works fine,
		970	except for some locales where character width differs between program-
		971	and rxvt-unicode-locales.
		972
		973	I have problems getting my input method working.
		974	Try a search engine, as this is slightly different for every input
		975	method server.
		976
		977	Here is a checklist:
		978
		979	- Make sure your locale *and* the imLocale are supported on your OS.
		980	Try "locale -a" or check the documentation for your OS.
		981
		982	- Make sure your locale or imLocale matches a locale supported by your
		983	XIM.
		984	For example, kinput2 does not support UTF-8 locales, you should use
		985	"ja_JP.EUC-JP" or equivalent.
		986
		987	- Make sure your XIM server is actually running.
		988	- Make sure the "XMODIFIERS" environment variable is set correctly when
		989	*starting* rxvt-unicode.
		990	When you want to use e.g. kinput2, it must be set to "@im=kinput2".
		991	For scim, use "@im=SCIM". You can see what input method servers are
		992	running with this command:
		993
		994	xprop -root XIM_SERVERS
		995
		996
		997
		998	My input method wants <some encoding> but I want UTF-8, what can I do?
		999	You can specify separate locales for the input method and the rest of
		1000	the terminal, using the resource "imlocale":
		1001
		1002	URxvt.imlocale: ja_JP.EUC-JP
		1003
		1004	Now you can start your terminal with "LC_CTYPE=ja_JP.UTF-8" and still
		1005	use your input method. Please note, however, that, depending on your
		1006	Xlib version, you may not be able to input characters outside "EUC-JP"
		1007	in a normal way then, as your input method limits you.
		1008
		1009	Rxvt-unicode crashes when the X Input Method changes or exits.
		1010	Unfortunately, this is unavoidable, as the XIM protocol is racy by
		1011	design. Applications can avoid some crashes at the expense of memory
		1012	leaks, and Input Methods can avoid some crashes by careful ordering at
		1013	exit time. kinput2 (and derived input methods) generally succeeds, while
		1014	SCIM (or similar input methods) fails. In the end, however, crashes
		1015	cannot be completely avoided even if both sides cooperate.
		1016
		1017	So the only workaround is not to kill your Input Method Servers.
		1018
		1019	Operating Systems / Package Maintaining
		1020	I am using Debian GNU/Linux and have a problem...
		1021	The Debian GNU/Linux package of rxvt-unicode in sarge contains large
		1022	patches that considerably change the behaviour of rxvt-unicode (but
		1023	unfortunately this notice has been removed). Before reporting a bug to
		1024	the original rxvt-unicode author please download and install the genuine
		1025	version (<http://software.schmorp.de#rxvt-unicode>) and try to reproduce
		1026	the problem. If you cannot, chances are that the problems are specific
		1027	to Debian GNU/Linux, in which case it should be reported via the Debian
		1028	Bug Tracking System (use "reportbug" to report the bug).
		1029
		1030	For other problems that also affect the Debian package, you can and
		1031	probably should use the Debian BTS, too, because, after all, it's also a
		1032	bug in the Debian version and it serves as a reminder for other users
		1033	that might encounter the same issue.
		1034
		1035	I am maintaining rxvt-unicode for distribution/OS XXX, any recommendation?
		1036	You should build one binary with the default options. configure now
		1037	enables most useful options, and the trend goes to making them
		1038	runtime-switchable, too, so there is usually no drawback to enabling
		1039	them, except higher disk and possibly memory usage. The perl interpreter
		1040	should be enabled, as important functionality (menus, selection, likely
		1041	more in the future) depends on it.
		1042
		1043	You should not overwrite the "perl-ext-common" snd "perl-ext" resources
		1044	system-wide (except maybe with "defaults"). This will result in useful
		1045	behaviour. If your distribution aims at low memory, add an empty
		1046	"perl-ext-common" resource to the app-defaults file. This will keep the
		1047	perl interpreter disabled until the user enables it.
		1048
		1049	If you can/want build more binaries, I recommend building a minimal one
		1050	with "--disable-everything" (very useful) and a maximal one with
		1051	"--enable-everything" (less useful, it will be very big due to a lot of
		1052	encodings built-in that increase download times and are rarely used).
		1053
		1054	I need to make it setuid/setgid to support utmp/ptys on my OS, is this safe?
		1055	It should be, starting with release 7.1. You are encouraged to properly
		1056	install urxvt with privileges necessary for your OS now.
		1057
		1058	When rxvt-unicode detects that it runs setuid or setgid, it will fork
		1059	into a helper process for privileged operations (pty handling on some
		1060	systems, utmp/wtmp/lastlog handling on others) and drop privileges
		1061	immediately. This is much safer than most other terminals that keep
		1062	privileges while running (but is more relevant to urxvt, as it contains
		1063	things as perl interpreters, which might be "helpful" to attackers).
		1064
		1065	This forking is done as the very first within main(), which is very
		1066	early and reduces possible bugs to initialisation code run before
		1067	main(), or things like the dynamic loader of your system, which should
		1068	result in very little risk.
		1069
		1070	I am on FreeBSD and rxvt-unicode does not seem to work at all.
		1071	Rxvt-unicode requires the symbol "__STDC_ISO_10646__" to be defined in
		1072	your compile environment, or an implementation that implements it,
		1073	whether it defines the symbol or not. "__STDC_ISO_10646__" requires that
		1074	wchar_t is represented as unicode.
		1075
		1076	As you might have guessed, FreeBSD does neither define this symbol nor
		1077	does it support it. Instead, it uses its own internal representation of
		1078	wchar_t. This is, of course, completely fine with respect to standards.
		1079
		1080	However, that means rxvt-unicode only works in "POSIX", "ISO-8859-1" and
		1081	"UTF-8" locales under FreeBSD (which all use Unicode as wchar_t).
		1082
		1083	"__STDC_ISO_10646__" is the only sane way to support multi-language apps
		1084	in an OS, as using a locale-dependent (and non-standardized)
		1085	representation of wchar_t makes it impossible to convert between wchar_t
		1086	(as used by X11 and your applications) and any other encoding without
		1087	implementing OS-specific-wrappers for each and every locale. There
		1088	simply are no APIs to convert wchar_t into anything except the current
		1089	locale encoding.
		1090
		1091	Some applications (such as the formidable mlterm) work around this by
		1092	carrying their own replacement functions for character set handling with
		1093	them, and either implementing OS-dependent hacks or doing multiple
		1094	conversions (which is slow and unreliable in case the OS implements
		1095	encodings slightly different than the terminal emulator).
		1096
		1097	The rxvt-unicode author insists that the right way to fix this is in the
		1098	system libraries once and for all, instead of forcing every app to carry
		1099	complete replacements for them :)
		1100
		1101	How can I use rxvt-unicode under cygwin?
		1102	rxvt-unicode should compile and run out of the box on cygwin, using the
		1103	X11 libraries that come with cygwin. libW11 emulation is no longer
		1104	supported (and makes no sense, either, as it only supported a single
		1105	font). I recommend starting the X-server in "-multiwindow" or
		1106	"-rootless" mode instead, which will result in similar look&feel as the
		1107	old libW11 emulation.
		1108
		1109	At the time of this writing, cygwin didn't seem to support any
		1110	multi-byte encodings (you might try "LC_CTYPE=C-UTF-8"), so you are
		1111	likely limited to 8-bit encodings.
		1112
		1113	Character widths are not correct.
		1114	urxvt uses the system wcwidth function to know the information about the
		1115	width of characters, so on systems with incorrect locale data you will
		1116	likely get bad results. Two notorious examples are Solaris 9, where
		1117	single-width characters like U+2514 are reported as double-width, and
		1118	Darwin 8, where combining chars are reported having width 1.
		1119
		1120	The solution is to upgrade your system or switch to a better one. A
		1121	possibly working workaround is to use a wcwidth implementation like
		1122
		1123	http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ucs/wcwidth.c
		1124
		1125	I want 256 colors
		1126	Are you sure you need 256 colors? 88 colors should be enough for most
		1127	purposes. If you really need more, there is an unsupported patch for it
		1128	in the doc directory, but please do not ask for it to be applied.
		1129

Diff Legend

–	Removed lines
+	Added lines
<	Changed lines
>	Changed lines