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16=head1 DESCRIPTION 16=head1 DESCRIPTION
17 17
18This document contains the FAQ, the RXVT TECHNICAL REFERENCE documenting 18This document contains the FAQ, the RXVT TECHNICAL REFERENCE documenting
19all escape sequences, and other background information. 19all escape sequences, and other background information.
20 20
21The newest version of this document is 21The newest version of this document is also available on the World Wide Web at
22also available on the World Wide Web at
23L<http://cvs.schmorp.de/browse/*checkout*/rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.html>. 22L<http://cvs.schmorp.de/browse/*checkout*/rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.html>.
24 23
25=head1 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS 24=head1 RXVT-UNICODE/URXVT FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
26 25
27=over 4
28 26
29=item The new selection selects pieces that are too big, how can I select 27=head2 Meta, Features & Commandline Issues
30single words?
31 28
32Yes. For example, if you want to select alphanumeric words, you can use 29=head3 My question isn't answered here, can I ask a human?
33the following resource:
34 30
35 URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([[:word:]]+) 31Before sending me mail, you could go to IRC: C<irc.freenode.net>,
32channel C<#rxvt-unicode> has some rxvt-unicode enthusiasts that might be
33interested in learning about new and exciting problems (but not FAQs :).
36 34
37If you click more than twice, the selection will be extended 35=head3 Does it support tabs, can I have a tabbed rxvt-unicode?
38more and more.
39 36
40To get a selection that is very similar to the old code, try this pattern: 37Beginning with version 7.3, there is a perl extension that implements a
38simple tabbed terminal. It is installed by default, so any of these should
39give you tabs:
41 40
42 URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([^"&'()*,;<=>?@[\\\\]^`{|})]+) 41 @@URXVT_NAME@@ -pe tabbed
43 42
44Please also note that the I<LeftClick Shift-LeftClik> combination also 43 URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,tabbed
45selects words like the old code.
46 44
47=item I don't like the new selection/popups/hotkeys/perl, how do I 45It will also work fine with tabbing functionality of many window managers
48change/disable it? 46or similar tabbing programs, and its embedding-features allow it to be
47embedded into other programs, as witnessed by F<doc/rxvt-tabbed> or
48the upcoming C<Gtk2::URxvt> perl module, which features a tabbed urxvt
49(murxvt) terminal as an example embedding application.
49 50
50You can disable the perl extension completely by setting the 51=head3 How do I know which rxvt-unicode version I'm using?
51B<perl-ext-common> resource to the empty string, which also keeps
52rxvt-unicode from initialising perl, saving memory.
53 52
54If you only want to disable specific features, you first have to 53The version number is displayed with the usage (-h). Also the escape
55identify which perl extension is responsible. For this, read the section 54sequence C<ESC [ 8 n> sets the window title to the version number. When
56B<PREPACKAGED EXTENSIONS> in the @@RXVT_NAME@@perl(3) manpage. For 55using the @@URXVT_NAME@@c client, the version displayed is that of the
57example, to disable the B<selection-popup> and B<option-popup>, specify 56daemon.
58this B<perl-ext-common> resource:
59 57
60 URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-selection-popup,-option-popup 58=head3 Rxvt-unicode uses gobs of memory, how can I reduce that?
61 59
62This will keep the default extensions, but disable the two popup 60Rxvt-unicode tries to obey the rule of not charging you for something you
63extensions. Some extensions can also be configured, for example, 61don't use. One thing you should try is to configure out all settings that
64scrollback search mode is triggered by B<M-s>. You can move it to any 62you don't need, for example, Xft support is a resource hog by design,
65other combination either by setting the B<searchable-scrollback> resource: 63when used. Compiling it out ensures that no Xft font will be loaded
64accidentally when rxvt-unicode tries to find a font for your characters.
66 65
67 URxvt.searchable-scrollback: CM-s 66Also, many people (me included) like large windows and even larger
67scrollback buffers: Without C<--enable-unicode3>, rxvt-unicode will use
686 bytes per screen cell. For a 160x?? window this amounts to almost a
69kilobyte per line. A scrollback buffer of 10000 lines will then (if full)
70use 10 Megabytes of memory. With C<--enable-unicode3> it gets worse, as
71rxvt-unicode then uses 8 bytes per screen cell.
68 72
73=head3 How can I start @@URXVT_NAME@@d in a race-free way?
74
75Try C<@@URXVT_NAME@@d -f -o>, which tells @@URXVT_NAME@@d to open the
76display, create the listening socket and then fork.
77
78=head3 How can I start @@URXVT_NAME@@d automatically when I run URXVT_NAME@@c?
79
80If you want to start @@URXVT_NAME@@d automatically whenever you run
81@@URXVT_NAME@@c and the daemon isn't running yet, use this script:
82
83 #!/bin/sh
84 @@URXVT_NAME@@c "$@"
85 if [ $? -eq 2 ]; then
86 @@URXVT_NAME@@d -q -o -f
87 @@URXVT_NAME@@c "$@"
88 fi
89
90This tries to create a new terminal, and if fails with exit status 2,
91meaning it couldn't connect to the daemon, it will start the daemon and
92re-run the command. Subsequent invocations of the script will re-use the
93existing daemon.
94
95=head3 How do I distinguish wether I'm running rxvt-unicode or a regular xterm? I need this to decide about setting colors etc.
96
97The original rxvt and rxvt-unicode always export the variable "COLORTERM",
98so you can check and see if that is set. Note that several programs, JED,
99slrn, Midnight Commander automatically check this variable to decide
100whether or not to use color.
101
102=head3 How do I set the correct, full IP address for the DISPLAY variable?
103
104If you've compiled rxvt-unicode with DISPLAY_IS_IP and have enabled
105insecure mode then it is possible to use the following shell script
106snippets to correctly set the display. If your version of rxvt-unicode
107wasn't also compiled with ESCZ_ANSWER (as assumed in these snippets) then
108the COLORTERM variable can be used to distinguish rxvt-unicode from a
109regular xterm.
110
111Courtesy of Chuck Blake <cblake@BBN.COM> with the following shell script
112snippets:
113
114 # Bourne/Korn/POSIX family of shells:
115 [ ${TERM:-foo} = foo ] && TERM=xterm # assume an xterm if we don't know
116 if [ ${TERM:-foo} = xterm ]; then
117 stty -icanon -echo min 0 time 15 # see if enhanced rxvt or not
118 echo -n '^[Z'
119 read term_id
120 stty icanon echo
121 if [ ""${term_id} = '^[[?1;2C' -a ${DISPLAY:-foo} = foo ]; then
122 echo -n '^[[7n' # query the rxvt we are in for the DISPLAY string
123 read DISPLAY # set it in our local shell
124 fi
125 fi
126
127=head3 How do I compile the manual pages on my own?
128
129You need to have a recent version of perl installed as F</usr/bin/perl>,
130one that comes with F<pod2man>, F<pod2text> and F<pod2html>. Then go to
131the doc subdirectory and enter C<make alldoc>.
132
69=item Isn't rxvt supposed to be small? Don't all those features bloat? 133=head3 Isn't rxvt-unicode supposed to be small? Don't all those features bloat?
70 134
71I often get asked about this, and I think, no, they didn't cause extra 135I often get asked about this, and I think, no, they didn't cause extra
72bloat. If you compare a minimal rxvt and a minimal urxvt, you can see 136bloat. If you compare a minimal rxvt and a minimal urxvt, you can see
73that the urxvt binary is larger (due to some encoding tables always being 137that the urxvt binary is larger (due to some encoding tables always being
74compiled in), but it actually uses less memory (RSS) after startup. Even 138compiled in), but it actually uses less memory (RSS) after startup. Even
78 142
79 text data bss drs rss filename 143 text data bss drs rss filename
80 98398 1664 24 15695 1824 rxvt --disable-everything 144 98398 1664 24 15695 1824 rxvt --disable-everything
81 188985 9048 66616 18222 1788 urxvt --disable-everything 145 188985 9048 66616 18222 1788 urxvt --disable-everything
82 146
83When you C<--enable-everything> (which _is_ unfair, as this involves xft 147When you C<--enable-everything> (which I<is> unfair, as this involves xft
84and full locale/XIM support which are quite bloaty inside libX11 and my 148and full locale/XIM support which are quite bloaty inside libX11 and my
85libc), the two diverge, but not unreasnobaly so. 149libc), the two diverge, but not unreasnobaly so.
86 150
87 text data bss drs rss filename 151 text data bss drs rss filename
88 163431 2152 24 20123 2060 rxvt --enable-everything 152 163431 2152 24 20123 2060 rxvt --enable-everything
106(21152k + extra 4204k in separate processes) or konsole (22200k + extra 170(21152k + extra 4204k in separate processes) or konsole (22200k + extra
10743180k in daemons that stay around after exit, plus half a minute of 17143180k in daemons that stay around after exit, plus half a minute of
108startup time, including the hundreds of warnings it spits out), it fares 172startup time, including the hundreds of warnings it spits out), it fares
109extremely well *g*. 173extremely well *g*.
110 174
111=item Why C++, isn't that unportable/bloated/uncool? 175=head3 Why C++, isn't that unportable/bloated/uncool?
112 176
113Is this a question? :) It comes up very often. The simple answer is: I had 177Is this a question? :) It comes up very often. The simple answer is: I had
114to write it, and C++ allowed me to write and maintain it in a fraction 178to write it, and C++ allowed me to write and maintain it in a fraction
115of the time and effort (which is a scarce resource for me). Put even 179of the time and effort (which is a scarce resource for me). Put even
116shorter: It simply wouldn't exist without C++. 180shorter: It simply wouldn't exist without C++.
140 /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000) 204 /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)
141 205
142No large bloated libraries (of course, none were linked in statically), 206No large bloated libraries (of course, none were linked in statically),
143except maybe libX11 :) 207except maybe libX11 :)
144 208
145=item Does it support tabs, can I have a tabbed rxvt-unicode?
146 209
147rxvt-unicode does not directly support tabs. It will work fine with 210=head2 Rendering, Font & Look and Feel Issues
148tabbing functionality of many window managers or similar tabbing programs,
149and its embedding-features allow it to be embedded into other programs,
150as witnessed by F<doc/rxvt-tabbed> or the upcoming C<Gtk2::URxvt> perl
151module, which features a tabbed urxvt (murxvt) terminal as an example
152embedding application.
153 211
154=item How do I know which rxvt-unicode version I'm using? 212=head3 I can't get transparency working, what am I doing wrong?
155 213
156The version number is displayed with the usage (-h). Also the escape 214First of all, transparency isn't officially supported in rxvt-unicode, so
157sequence C<ESC [ 8 n> sets the window title to the version number. When 215you are mostly on your own. Do not bug the author about it (but you may
158using the @@RXVT_NAME@@c client, the version displayed is that of the 216bug everybody else). Also, if you can't get it working consider it a rite
159daemon. 217of passage: ... and you failed.
160 218
161=item I am using Debian GNU/Linux and have a problem... 219Here are four ways to get transparency. B<Do> read the manpage and option
220descriptions for the programs mentioned and rxvt-unicode. Really, do it!
162 221
163The Debian GNU/Linux package of rxvt-unicode in sarge contains large 2221. Use inheritPixmap:
164patches that considerably change the behaviour of rxvt-unicode (but
165unfortunately this notice has been removed). Before reporting a bug to
166the original rxvt-unicode author please download and install the genuine
167version (L<http://software.schmorp.de#rxvt-unicode>) and try to reproduce
168the problem. If you cannot, chances are that the problems are specific to
169Debian GNU/Linux, in which case it should be reported via the Debian Bug
170Tracking System (use C<reportbug> to report the bug).
171 223
172For other problems that also affect the Debian package, you can and 224 Esetroot wallpaper.jpg
173probably should use the Debian BTS, too, because, after all, it's also a 225 @@URXVT_NAME@@ -ip -tint red -sh 40
174bug in the Debian version and it serves as a reminder for other users that
175might encounter the same issue.
176 226
177=item I am maintaining rxvt-unicode for distribution/OS XXX, any 227That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack transparency and tinting
178recommendation? 228support, or you are unable to read.
179 229
180You should build one binary with the default options. F<configure> 2302. Use a simple pixmap and emulate pseudo-transparency. This enables you
181now enables most useful options, and the trend goes to making them 231to use effects other than tinting and shading: Just shade/tint/whatever
182runtime-switchable, too, so there is usually no drawback to enbaling them, 232your picture with gimp or any other tool:
183except higher disk and possibly memory usage. The perl interpreter should
184be enabled, as important functionality (menus, selection, likely more in
185the future) depends on it.
186 233
187You should not overwrite the C<perl-ext-common> snd C<perl-ext> resources 234 convert wallpaper.jpg -blur 20x20 -modulate 30 background.xpm
188system-wide (except maybe with C<defaults>). This will result in useful 235 @@URXVT_NAME@@ -pixmap background.xpm -pe automove-background
189behaviour. If your distribution aims at low memory, add an empty
190C<perl-ext-common> resource to the app-defaults file. This will keep the
191perl interpreter disabled until the user enables it.
192 236
193If you can/want build more binaries, I recommend building a minimal 237That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack XPM and Perl support, or you
194one with C<--disable-everything> (very useful) and a maximal one with 238are unable to read.
195C<--enable-everything> (less useful, it will be very big due to a lot of
196encodings built-in that increase download times and are rarely used).
197 239
198=item I need to make it setuid/setgid to support utmp/ptys on my OS, is this safe? 2403. Use an ARGB visual:
199 241
200It should be, starting with release 7.1. You are encouraged to properly 242 @@URXVT_NAME@@ -depth 32 -fg grey90 -bg rgba:0000/0000/4444/cccc
201install urxvt with privileges necessary for your OS now.
202 243
203When rxvt-unicode detects that it runs setuid or setgid, it will fork 244This requires XFT support, and the support of your X-server. If that
204into a helper process for privileged operations (pty handling on some 245doesn't work for you, blame Xorg and Keith Packard. ARGB visuals aren't
205systems, utmp/wtmp/lastlog handling on others) and drop privileges 246there yet, no matter what they claim. Rxvt-Unicode contains the neccessary
206immediately. This is much safer than most other terminals that keep 247bugfixes and workarounds for Xft and Xlib to make it work, but that
207privileges while running (but is more relevant to urxvt, as it contains 248doesn't mean that your WM has the required kludges in place.
208things as perl interpreters, which might be "helpful" to attackers).
209 249
210This forking is done as the very first within main(), which is very early 2504. Use xcompmgr and let it do the job:
211and reduces possible bugs to initialisation code run before main(), or
212things like the dynamic loader of your system, which should result in very
213little risk.
214 251
252 xprop -frame -f _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 32c \
253 -set _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 0xc0000000
254
255Then click on a window you want to make transparent. Replace C<0xc0000000>
256by other values to change the degree of opacity. If it doesn't work and
257your server crashes, you got to keep the pieces.
258
259=head3 Why does rxvt-unicode sometimes leave pixel droppings?
260
261Most fonts were not designed for terminal use, which means that character
262size varies a lot. A font that is otherwise fine for terminal use might
263contain some characters that are simply too wide. Rxvt-unicode will avoid
264these characters. For characters that are just "a bit" too wide a special
265"careful" rendering mode is used that redraws adjacent characters.
266
267All of this requires that fonts do not lie about character sizes,
268however: Xft fonts often draw glyphs larger than their acclaimed bounding
269box, and rxvt-unicode has no way of detecting this (the correct way is to
270ask for the character bounding box, which unfortunately is wrong in these
271cases).
272
273It's not clear (to me at least), wether this is a bug in Xft, freetype,
274or the respective font. If you encounter this problem you might try using
275the C<-lsp> option to give the font more height. If that doesn't work, you
276might be forced to use a different font.
277
278All of this is not a problem when using X11 core fonts, as their bounding
279box data is correct.
280
281=head3 How can I keep rxvt-unicode from using reverse video so much?
282
283First of all, make sure you are running with the right terminal settings
284(C<TERM=rxvt-unicode>), which will get rid of most of these effects. Then
285make sure you have specified colours for italic and bold, as otherwise
286rxvt-unicode might use reverse video to simulate the effect:
287
288 URxvt.colorBD: white
289 URxvt.colorIT: green
290
291=head3 Some programs assume totally weird colours (red instead of blue), how can I fix that?
292
293For some unexplainable reason, some rare programs assume a very weird
294colour palette when confronted with a terminal with more than the standard
2958 colours (rxvt-unicode supports 88). The right fix is, of course, to fix
296these programs not to assume non-ISO colours without very good reasons.
297
298In the meantime, you can either edit your C<rxvt-unicode> terminfo
299definition to only claim 8 colour support or use C<TERM=rxvt>, which will
300fix colours but keep you from using other rxvt-unicode features.
301
302=head3 Can I switch the fonts at runtime?
303
304Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which has the same
305effect as using the C<-fn> switch, and takes effect immediately:
306
307 printf '\e]50;%s\007' "9x15bold,xft:Kochi Gothic"
308
309This is useful if you e.g. work primarily with japanese (and prefer a
310japanese font), but you have to switch to chinese temporarily, where
311japanese fonts would only be in your way.
312
313You can think of this as a kind of manual ISO-2022 switching.
314
315=head3 Why do italic characters look as if clipped?
316
317Many fonts have difficulties with italic characters and hinting. For
318example, the otherwise very nicely hinted font C<xft:Bitstream Vera Sans
319Mono> completely fails in it's italic face. A workaround might be to
320enable freetype autohinting, i.e. like this:
321
322 URxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true
323 URxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true
324
325=head3 Can I speed up Xft rendering somehow?
326
327Yes, the most obvious way to speed it up is to avoid Xft entirely, as
328it is simply slow. If you still want Xft fonts you might try to disable
329antialiasing (by appending C<:antialias=false>), which saves lots of
330memory and also speeds up rendering considerably.
331
332=head3 Rxvt-unicode doesn't seem to anti-alias its fonts, what is wrong?
333
334Rxvt-unicode will use whatever you specify as a font. If it needs to
335fall back to it's default font search list it will prefer X11 core
336fonts, because they are small and fast, and then use Xft fonts. It has
337antialiasing disabled for most of them, because the author thinks they
338look best that way.
339
340If you want antialiasing, you have to specify the fonts manually.
341
342=head3 What's with this bold/blink stuff?
343
344If no bold colour is set via C<colorBD:>, bold will invert text using the
345standard foreground colour.
346
347For the standard background colour, blinking will actually make the
348text blink when compiled with C<--enable-blinking>. with standard
349colours. Without C<--enable-blinking>, the blink attribute will be
350ignored.
351
352On ANSI colours, bold/blink attributes are used to set high-intensity
353foreground/background colors.
354
355color0-7 are the low-intensity colors.
356
357color8-15 are the corresponding high-intensity colors.
358
359=head3 I don't like the screen colors. How do I change them?
360
361You can change the screen colors at run-time using F<~/.Xdefaults>
362resources (or as long-options).
363
364Here are values that are supposed to resemble a VGA screen,
365including the murky brown that passes for low-intensity yellow:
366
367 URxvt.color0: #000000
368 URxvt.color1: #A80000
369 URxvt.color2: #00A800
370 URxvt.color3: #A8A800
371 URxvt.color4: #0000A8
372 URxvt.color5: #A800A8
373 URxvt.color6: #00A8A8
374 URxvt.color7: #A8A8A8
375
376 URxvt.color8: #000054
377 URxvt.color9: #FF0054
378 URxvt.color10: #00FF54
379 URxvt.color11: #FFFF54
380 URxvt.color12: #0000FF
381 URxvt.color13: #FF00FF
382 URxvt.color14: #00FFFF
383 URxvt.color15: #FFFFFF
384
385And here is a more complete set of non-standard colors.
386
387 URxvt.cursorColor: #dc74d1
388 URxvt.pointerColor: #dc74d1
389 URxvt.background: #0e0e0e
390 URxvt.foreground: #4ad5e1
391 URxvt.color0: #000000
392 URxvt.color8: #8b8f93
393 URxvt.color1: #dc74d1
394 URxvt.color9: #dc74d1
395 URxvt.color2: #0eb8c7
396 URxvt.color10: #0eb8c7
397 URxvt.color3: #dfe37e
398 URxvt.color11: #dfe37e
399 URxvt.color5: #9e88f0
400 URxvt.color13: #9e88f0
401 URxvt.color6: #73f7ff
402 URxvt.color14: #73f7ff
403 URxvt.color7: #e1dddd
404 URxvt.color15: #e1dddd
405
406They have been described (not by me) as "pretty girly".
407
408=head3 Why do some characters look so much different than others?
409
410See next entry.
411
412=head3 How does rxvt-unicode choose fonts?
413
414Most fonts do not contain the full range of Unicode, which is
415fine. Chances are that the font you (or the admin/package maintainer of
416your system/os) have specified does not cover all the characters you want
417to display.
418
419B<rxvt-unicode> makes a best-effort try at finding a replacement
420font. Often the result is fine, but sometimes the chosen font looks
421bad/ugly/wrong. Some fonts have totally strange characters that don't
422resemble the correct glyph at all, and rxvt-unicode lacks the artificial
423intelligence to detect that a specific glyph is wrong: it has to believe
424the font that the characters it claims to contain indeed look correct.
425
426In that case, select a font of your taste and add it to the font list,
427e.g.:
428
429 @@URXVT_NAME@@ -fn basefont,font2,font3...
430
431When rxvt-unicode sees a character, it will first look at the base
432font. If the base font does not contain the character, it will go to the
433next font, and so on. Specifying your own fonts will also speed up this
434search and use less resources within rxvt-unicode and the X-server.
435
436The only limitation is that none of the fonts may be larger than the base
437font, as the base font defines the terminal character cell size, which
438must be the same due to the way terminals work.
439
440=head3 Why do some chinese characters look so different than others?
441
442This is because there is a difference between script and language --
443rxvt-unicode does not know which language the text that is output is,
444as it only knows the unicode character codes. If rxvt-unicode first
445sees a japanese/chinese character, it might choose a japanese font for
446display. Subsequent japanese characters will use that font. Now, many
447chinese characters aren't represented in japanese fonts, so when the first
448non-japanese character comes up, rxvt-unicode will look for a chinese font
449-- unfortunately at this point, it will still use the japanese font for
450chinese characters that are also in the japanese font.
451
452The workaround is easy: just tag a chinese font at the end of your font
453list (see the previous question). The key is to view the font list as
454a preference list: If you expect more japanese, list a japanese font
455first. If you expect more chinese, put a chinese font first.
456
457In the future it might be possible to switch language preferences at
458runtime (the internal data structure has no problem with using different
459fonts for the same character at the same time, but no interface for this
460has been designed yet).
461
462Until then, you might get away with switching fonts at runtime (see L<Can
463I switch the fonts at runtime?> later in this document).
464
465=head2 Keyboard, Mouse & User Interaction
466
467=head3 The new selection selects pieces that are too big, how can I select single words?
468
469If you want to select e.g. alphanumeric words, you can use the following
470setting:
471
472 URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([[:word:]]+)
473
474If you click more than twice, the selection will be extended
475more and more.
476
477To get a selection that is very similar to the old code, try this pattern:
478
479 URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([^"&'()*,;<=>?@[\\\\]^`{|})]+)
480
481Please also note that the I<LeftClick Shift-LeftClik> combination also
482selects words like the old code.
483
484=head3 I don't like the new selection/popups/hotkeys/perl, how do I change/disable it?
485
486You can disable the perl extension completely by setting the
487B<perl-ext-common> resource to the empty string, which also keeps
488rxvt-unicode from initialising perl, saving memory.
489
490If you only want to disable specific features, you first have to
491identify which perl extension is responsible. For this, read the section
492B<PREPACKAGED EXTENSIONS> in the @@URXVT_NAME@@perl(3) manpage. For
493example, to disable the B<selection-popup> and B<option-popup>, specify
494this B<perl-ext-common> resource:
495
496 URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-selection-popup,-option-popup
497
498This will keep the default extensions, but disable the two popup
499extensions. Some extensions can also be configured, for example,
500scrollback search mode is triggered by B<M-s>. You can move it to any
501other combination either by setting the B<searchable-scrollback> resource:
502
503 URxvt.searchable-scrollback: CM-s
504
505=head3 The cursor moves when selecting text in the current input line, how do I switch this off?
506
507See next entry.
508
509=head3 During rlogin/ssh/telnet/etc. sessions, clicking near the cursor outputs strange escape sequences, how do I fix this?
510
511These are caused by the C<readline> perl extension. Under normal
512circumstances, it will move your cursor around when you click into the
513line that contains it. It tries hard not to do this at the wrong moment,
514but when running a program that doesn't parse cursor movements or in some
515cases during rlogin sessions, it fails to detect this properly.
516
517You can permamently switch this feature off by disabling the C<readline>
518extension:
519
520 URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-readline
521
522=head3 My numerical keypad acts weird and generates differing output?
523
524Some Debian GNUL/Linux users seem to have this problem, although no
525specific details were reported so far. It is possible that this is caused
526by the wrong C<TERM> setting, although the details of wether and how
527this can happen are unknown, as C<TERM=rxvt> should offer a compatible
528keymap. See the answer to the previous question, and please report if that
529helped.
530
531=head3 My Compose (Multi_key) key is no longer working.
532
533The most common causes for this are that either your locale is not set
534correctly, or you specified a B<preeditStyle> that is not supported by
535your input method. For example, if you specified B<OverTheSpot> and
536your input method (e.g. the default input method handling Compose keys)
537does not support this (for instance because it is not visual), then
538rxvt-unicode will continue without an input method.
539
540In this case either do not specify a B<preeditStyle> or specify more than
541one pre-edit style, such as B<OverTheSpot,Root,None>.
542
543=head3 I cannot type C<Ctrl-Shift-2> to get an ASCII NUL character due to ISO 14755
544
545Either try C<Ctrl-2> alone (it often is mapped to ASCII NUL even on
546international keyboards) or simply use ISO 14755 support to your
547advantage, typing <Ctrl-Shift-0> to get a ASCII NUL. This works for other
548codes, too, such as C<Ctrl-Shift-1-d> to type the default telnet escape
549character and so on.
550
551=head3 Mouse cut/paste suddenly no longer works.
552
553Make sure that mouse reporting is actually turned off since killing
554some editors prematurely may leave the mouse in mouse report mode. I've
555heard that tcsh may use mouse reporting unless it otherwise specified. A
556quick check is to see if cut/paste works when the Alt or Shift keys are
557depressed.
558
559=head3 What's with the strange Backspace/Delete key behaviour?
560
561Assuming that the physical Backspace key corresponds to the
562BackSpace keysym (not likely for Linux ... see the following
563question) there are two standard values that can be used for
564Backspace: C<^H> and C<^?>.
565
566Historically, either value is correct, but rxvt-unicode adopts the debian
567policy of using C<^?> when unsure, because it's the one only only correct
568choice :).
569
570Rxvt-unicode tries to inherit the current stty settings and uses the value
571of `erase' to guess the value for backspace. If rxvt-unicode wasn't
572started from a terminal (say, from a menu or by remote shell), then the
573system value of `erase', which corresponds to CERASE in <termios.h>, will
574be used (which may not be the same as your stty setting).
575
576For starting a new rxvt-unicode:
577
578 # use Backspace = ^H
579 $ stty erase ^H
580 $ @@URXVT_NAME@@
581
582 # use Backspace = ^?
583 $ stty erase ^?
584 $ @@URXVT_NAME@@
585
586Toggle with C<ESC [ 36 h> / C<ESC [ 36 l>.
587
588For an existing rxvt-unicode:
589
590 # use Backspace = ^H
591 $ stty erase ^H
592 $ echo -n "^[[36h"
593
594 # use Backspace = ^?
595 $ stty erase ^?
596 $ echo -n "^[[36l"
597
598This helps satisfy some of the Backspace discrepancies that occur, but
599if you use Backspace = C<^H>, make sure that the termcap/terminfo value
600properly reflects that.
601
602The Delete key is a another casualty of the ill-defined Backspace problem.
603To avoid confusion between the Backspace and Delete keys, the Delete
604key has been assigned an escape sequence to match the vt100 for Execute
605(C<ESC [ 3 ~>) and is in the supplied termcap/terminfo.
606
607Some other Backspace problems:
608
609some editors use termcap/terminfo,
610some editors (vim I'm told) expect Backspace = ^H,
611GNU Emacs (and Emacs-like editors) use ^H for help.
612
613Perhaps someday this will all be resolved in a consistent manner.
614
615=head3 I don't like the key-bindings. How do I change them?
616
617There are some compile-time selections available via configure. Unless
618you have run "configure" with the C<--disable-resources> option you can
619use the `keysym' resource to alter the keystrings associated with keysyms.
620
621Here's an example for a URxvt session started using C<@@URXVT_NAME@@ -name URxvt>
622
623 URxvt.keysym.Home: \033[1~
624 URxvt.keysym.End: \033[4~
625 URxvt.keysym.C-apostrophe: \033<C-'>
626 URxvt.keysym.C-slash: \033<C-/>
627 URxvt.keysym.C-semicolon: \033<C-;>
628 URxvt.keysym.C-grave: \033<C-`>
629 URxvt.keysym.C-comma: \033<C-,>
630 URxvt.keysym.C-period: \033<C-.>
631 URxvt.keysym.C-0x60: \033<C-`>
632 URxvt.keysym.C-Tab: \033<C-Tab>
633 URxvt.keysym.C-Return: \033<C-Return>
634 URxvt.keysym.S-Return: \033<S-Return>
635 URxvt.keysym.S-space: \033<S-Space>
636 URxvt.keysym.M-Up: \033<M-Up>
637 URxvt.keysym.M-Down: \033<M-Down>
638 URxvt.keysym.M-Left: \033<M-Left>
639 URxvt.keysym.M-Right: \033<M-Right>
640 URxvt.keysym.M-C-0: list \033<M-C- 0123456789 >
641 URxvt.keysym.M-C-a: list \033<M-C- abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz >
642 URxvt.keysym.F12: command:\033]701;zh_CN.GBK\007
643
644See some more examples in the documentation for the B<keysym> resource.
645
646=head3 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
647
648 KP_Insert == Insert
649 F22 == Print
650 F27 == Home
651 F29 == Prior
652 F33 == End
653 F35 == Next
654
655Rather than have rxvt-unicode try to accommodate all the various possible
656keyboard mappings, it is better to use `xmodmap' to remap the keys as
657required for your particular machine.
658
659
660
661=head2 Terminal Configuration
662
663=head3 Can I see a typical configuration?
664
665The default configuration tries to be xterm-like, which I don't like that
666much, but it's least surprise to regular users.
667
668As a rxvt or rxvt-unicode user, you are practically supposed to invest
669time into customising your terminal. To get you started, here is the
670author's .Xdefaults entries, with comments on what they do:
671
672 URxvt.cutchars: "()*,<>[]{}|'
673 URxvt.print-pipe: cat >/tmp/xxx
674
675These are just for testing stuff.
676
677 URxvt.imLocale: ja_JP.UTF-8
678 URxvt.preeditType: OnTheSpot,None
679
680This tells rxvt-unicode to use a special locale when communicating with
681the X Input Method, and also tells it to only use the OnTheSpot pre-edit
682type, which requires the C<xim-onthespot> perl extension but rewards me
683with correct-looking fonts.
684
685 URxvt.perl-lib: /root/lib/urxvt
686 URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,selection-autotransform,selection-pastebin,xim-onthespot,remote-clipboard
687 URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ( at .*? line \\d+)
688 URxvt.selection.pattern-1: ^(/[^:]+):\
689 URxvt.selection-autotransform.0: s/^([^:[:space:]]+):(\\d+):?$/:e \\Q$1\\E\\x0d:$2\\x0d/
690 URxvt.selection-autotransform.1: s/^ at (.*?) line (\\d+)$/:e \\Q$1\\E\\x0d:$2\\x0d/
691
692This is my perl configuration. The first two set the perl library
693directory and also tells urxvt to use a large number of extensions. I
694develop for myself mostly, so I actually use most of the extensions I
695write.
696
697The selection stuff mainly makes the selection perl-error-message aware
698and tells it to convert pelr error mssages into vi-commands to load the
699relevant file and go tot he error line number.
700
701 URxvt.scrollstyle: plain
702 URxvt.secondaryScroll: true
703
704As the documentation says: plain is the preferred scrollbar for the
705author. The C<secondaryScroll> confgiures urxvt to scroll in full-screen
706apps, like screen, so lines scorlled out of screen end up in urxvt's
707scrollback buffer.
708
709 URxvt.background: #000000
710 URxvt.foreground: gray90
711 URxvt.color7: gray90
712 URxvt.colorBD: #ffffff
713 URxvt.cursorColor: #e0e080
714 URxvt.throughColor: #8080f0
715 URxvt.highlightColor: #f0f0f0
716
717Some colours. Not sure which ones are being used or even non-defaults, but
718these are in my .Xdefaults. Most notably, they set foreground/background
719to light gray/black, and also make sure that the colour 7 matches the
720default foreground colour.
721
722 URxvt.underlineColor: yellow
723
724Another colour, makes underline lines look different. Sometimes hurts, but
725is mostly a nice effect.
726
727 URxvt.geometry: 154x36
728 URxvt.loginShell: false
729 URxvt.meta: ignore
730 URxvt.utmpInhibit: true
731
732Uh, well, should be mostly self-explanatory. By specifying some defaults
733manually, I can quickly switch them for testing.
734
735 URxvt.saveLines: 8192
736
737A large scrollback buffer is essential. Really.
738
739 URxvt.mapAlert: true
740
741The only case I use it is for my IRC window, which I like to keep
742iconified till people msg me (which beeps).
743
744 URxvt.visualBell: true
745
746The audible bell is often annoying, especially when in a crowd.
747
748 URxvt.insecure: true
749
750Please don't hack my mutt! Ooops...
751
752 URxvt.pastableTabs: false
753
754I once thought this is a great idea.
755
756 urxvt.font: 9x15bold,\
757 -misc-fixed-bold-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1,\
758 -misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1, \
759 [codeset=JISX0208]xft:Kochi Gothic, \
760 xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:autohint=true, \
761 xft:Code2000:antialias=false
762 urxvt.boldFont: -xos4-terminus-bold-r-normal--14-140-72-72-c-80-iso8859-15
763 urxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true
764 urxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true
765
766I wrote rxvt-unicode to be able to specify fonts exactly. So don't be
767overwhelmed. A special note: the C<9x15bold> mentioend above is actually
768the version from XFree-3.3, as XFree-4 replaced it by a totally different
769font (different glyphs for C<;> and many other harmless characters),
770while the second font is actually the C<9x15bold> from XFree4/XOrg. The
771bold version has less chars than the medium version, so I use it for rare
772characters, too. Whene ditign sources with vim, I use italic for comments
773and other stuff, which looks quite good with Bitstream Vera anti-aliased.
774
775Terminus is a quite bad font (many very wrong glyphs), but for most of my
776purposes, it works, and gives a different look, as my normal (Non-bold)
777font is already bold, and I want to see a difference between bold and
778normal fonts.
779
780Please note that I used the C<urxvt> instance name and not the C<URxvt>
781class name. Thats because I use different configs for different purposes,
782for example, my IRC window is started with C<-name IRC>, and uses these
783defaults:
784
785 IRC*title: IRC
786 IRC*geometry: 87x12+535+542
787 IRC*saveLines: 0
788 IRC*mapAlert: true
789 IRC*font: suxuseuro
790 IRC*boldFont: suxuseuro
791 IRC*colorBD: white
792 IRC*keysym.M-C-1: command:\033]710;suxuseuro\007\033]711;suxuseuro\007
793 IRC*keysym.M-C-2: command:\033]710;9x15bold\007\033]711;9x15bold\007
794
795C<Alt-Shift-1> and C<Alt-Shift-2> switch between two different font
796sizes. C<suxuseuro> allows me to keep an eye (and actually read)
797stuff while keeping a very small window. If somebody pastes something
798complicated (e.g. japanese), I temporarily switch to a larger font.
799
800The above is all in my C<.Xdefaults> (I don't use C<.Xresources> nor
801C<xrdb>). I also have some resources in a separate C<.Xdefaults-hostname>
802file for different hosts, for example, on ym main desktop, I use:
803
804 URxvt.keysym.C-M-q: command:\033[3;5;5t
805 URxvt.keysym.C-M-y: command:\033[3;5;606t
806 URxvt.keysym.C-M-e: command:\033[3;1605;5t
807 URxvt.keysym.C-M-c: command:\033[3;1605;606t
808 URxvt.keysym.C-M-p: perl:test
809
810The first for keysym definitions allow me to quickly bring some windows
811in the layout I like most. Ion users might start laughing but will stop
812immediately when I tell them that I use my own Fvwm2 module for much the
813same effect as Ion provides, and I only very rarely use the above key
814combinations :->
815
816=head3 Why doesn't rxvt-unicode read my resources?
817
818Well, why, indeed? It does, in a way very similar to other X
819applications. Most importantly, this means that if you or your OS loads
820resources into the X display (the right way to do it), rxvt-unicode will
821ignore any resource files in your home directory. It will only read
822F<$HOME/.Xdefaults> when no resources are attached to the display.
823
824If you have or use an F<$HOME/.Xresources> file, chances are that
825resources are loaded into your X-server. In this case, you have to
826re-login after every change (or run F<xrdb -merge $HOME/.Xresources>).
827
828Also consider the form resources have to use:
829
830 URxvt.resource: value
831
832If you want to use another form (there are lots of different ways of
833specifying resources), make sure you understand wether and why it
834works. If unsure, use the form above.
835
215=item When I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data? 836=head3 When I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?
216 837
217The terminal description used by rxvt-unicode is not as widely available 838The terminal description used by rxvt-unicode is not as widely available
218as that for xterm, or even rxvt (for which the same problem often arises). 839as that for xterm, or even rxvt (for which the same problem often arises).
219 840
220The correct solution for this problem is to install the terminfo, this can 841The correct solution for this problem is to install the terminfo, this can
236resource to set it: 857resource to set it:
237 858
238 URxvt.termName: rxvt 859 URxvt.termName: rxvt
239 860
240If you don't plan to use B<rxvt> (quite common...) you could also replace 861If you don't plan to use B<rxvt> (quite common...) you could also replace
241the rxvt terminfo file with the rxvt-unicode one. 862the rxvt terminfo file with the rxvt-unicode one and use C<TERM=rxvt>.
242 863
243=item C<tic> outputs some error when compiling the terminfo entry. 864=head3 C<tic> outputs some error when compiling the terminfo entry.
244 865
245Most likely it's the empty definition for C<enacs=>. Just replace it by 866Most likely it's the empty definition for C<enacs=>. Just replace it by
246C<enacs=\E[0@> and try again. 867C<enacs=\E[0@> and try again.
247 868
248=item C<bash>'s readline does not work correctly under @@RXVT_NAME@@. 869=head3 C<bash>'s readline does not work correctly under @@URXVT_NAME@@.
249 870
871See next entry.
872
250=item I need a termcap file entry. 873=head3 I need a termcap file entry.
251 874
252One reason you might want this is that some distributions or operating 875One reason you might want this is that some distributions or operating
253systems still compile some programs using the long-obsoleted termcap 876systems still compile some programs using the long-obsoleted termcap
254library (Fedora Core's bash is one example) and rely on a termcap entry 877library (Fedora Core's bash is one example) and rely on a termcap entry
255for C<rxvt-unicode>. 878for C<rxvt-unicode>.
281 :sc=\E7:se=\E[27m:sf=^J:so=\E[7m:sr=\EM:st=\EH:ta=^I:\ 904 :sc=\E7:se=\E[27m:sf=^J:so=\E[7m:sr=\EM:st=\EH:ta=^I:\
282 :te=\E[r\E[?1049l:ti=\E[?1049h:ue=\E[24m:up=\E[A:\ 905 :te=\E[r\E[?1049l:ti=\E[?1049h:ue=\E[24m:up=\E[A:\
283 :us=\E[4m:vb=\E[?5h\E[?5l:ve=\E[?25h:vi=\E[?25l:\ 906 :us=\E[4m:vb=\E[?5h\E[?5l:ve=\E[?25h:vi=\E[?25l:\
284 :vs=\E[?25h: 907 :vs=\E[?25h:
285 908
286=item Why does C<ls> no longer have coloured output? 909=head3 Why does C<ls> no longer have coloured output?
287 910
288The C<ls> in the GNU coreutils unfortunately doesn't use terminfo to 911The C<ls> in the GNU coreutils unfortunately doesn't use terminfo to
289decide wether a terminal has colour, but uses it's own configuration 912decide wether a terminal has colour, but uses it's own configuration
290file. Needless to say, C<rxvt-unicode> is not in it's default file (among 913file. Needless to say, C<rxvt-unicode> is not in it's default file (among
291with most other terminals supporting colour). Either add: 914with most other terminals supporting colour). Either add:
296 919
297 alias ls='ls --color=auto' 920 alias ls='ls --color=auto'
298 921
299to your C<.profile> or C<.bashrc>. 922to your C<.profile> or C<.bashrc>.
300 923
301=item Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. use the 88 colour mode? 924=head3 Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. use the 88 colour mode?
302 925
926See next entry.
927
303=item Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. make use of italic? 928=head3 Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. make use of italic?
304 929
930See next entry.
931
305=item Why are the secondary screen-related options not working properly? 932=head3 Why are the secondary screen-related options not working properly?
306 933
307Make sure you are using C<TERM=rxvt-unicode>. Some pre-packaged 934Make sure you are using C<TERM=rxvt-unicode>. Some pre-packaged
308distributions (most notably Debian GNU/Linux) break rxvt-unicode 935distributions (most notably Debian GNU/Linux) break rxvt-unicode
309by setting C<TERM> to C<rxvt>, which doesn't have these extra 936by setting C<TERM> to C<rxvt>, which doesn't have these extra
310features. Unfortunately, some of these (most notably, again, Debian 937features. Unfortunately, some of these (most notably, again, Debian
311GNU/Linux) furthermore fail to even install the C<rxvt-unicode> terminfo 938GNU/Linux) furthermore fail to even install the C<rxvt-unicode> terminfo
312file, so you will need to install it on your own (See the question B<When 939file, so you will need to install it on your own (See the question B<When
313I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?> on 940I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?> on
314how to do this). 941how to do this).
315 942
316=item My numerical keypad acts weird and generates differing output?
317 943
318Some Debian GNUL/Linux users seem to have this problem, although no 944=head2 Encoding / Locale / Input Method Issues
319specific details were reported so far. It is possible that this is caused
320by the wrong C<TERM> setting, although the details of wether and how
321this can happen are unknown, as C<TERM=rxvt> should offer a compatible
322keymap. See the answer to the previous question, and please report if that
323helped.
324 945
325=item Rxvt-unicode does not seem to understand the selected encoding? 946=head3 Rxvt-unicode does not seem to understand the selected encoding?
326 947
948See next entry.
949
327=item Unicode does not seem to work? 950=head3 Unicode does not seem to work?
328 951
329If you encounter strange problems like typing an accented character but 952If you encounter strange problems like typing an accented character but
330getting two unrelated other characters or similar, or if program output is 953getting two unrelated other characters or similar, or if program output is
331subtly garbled, then you should check your locale settings. 954subtly garbled, then you should check your locale settings.
332 955
352 975
353If nothing works and you are sure that everything is set correctly then 976If nothing works and you are sure that everything is set correctly then
354you will need to remember a little known fact: Some programs just don't 977you will need to remember a little known fact: Some programs just don't
355support locales :( 978support locales :(
356 979
357=item Why do some characters look so much different than others? 980=head3 How does rxvt-unicode determine the encoding to use?
358 981
359=item How does rxvt-unicode choose fonts? 982See next entry.
360 983
361Most fonts do not contain the full range of Unicode, which is 984=head3 Is there an option to switch encodings?
362fine. Chances are that the font you (or the admin/package maintainer of
363your system/os) have specified does not cover all the characters you want
364to display.
365 985
366B<rxvt-unicode> makes a best-effort try at finding a replacement 986Unlike some other terminals, rxvt-unicode has no encoding switch, and no
367font. Often the result is fine, but sometimes the chosen font looks 987specific "utf-8" mode, such as xterm. In fact, it doesn't even know about
368bad/ugly/wrong. Some fonts have totally strange characters that don't 988UTF-8 or any other encodings with respect to terminal I/O.
369resemble the correct glyph at all, and rxvt-unicode lacks the artificial
370intelligence to detect that a specific glyph is wrong: it has to believe
371the font that the characters it claims to contain indeed look correct.
372 989
373In that case, select a font of your taste and add it to the font list, 990The reasons is that there exists a perfectly fine mechanism for selecting
374e.g.: 991the encoding, doing I/O and (most important) communicating this to all
375 992applications so everybody agrees on character properties such as width
376 @@RXVT_NAME@@ -fn basefont,font2,font3... 993and code number. This mechanism is the I<locale>. Applications not using
377 994that info will have problems (for example, C<xterm> gets the width of
378When rxvt-unicode sees a character, it will first look at the base 995characters wrong as it uses it's own, locale-independent table under all
379font. If the base font does not contain the character, it will go to the
380next font, and so on. Specifying your own fonts will also speed up this
381search and use less resources within rxvt-unicode and the X-server.
382
383The only limitation is that none of the fonts may be larger than the base
384font, as the base font defines the terminal character cell size, which
385must be the same due to the way terminals work.
386
387=item Why do some chinese characters look so different than others?
388
389This is because there is a difference between script and language --
390rxvt-unicode does not know which language the text that is output is,
391as it only knows the unicode character codes. If rxvt-unicode first
392sees a japanese/chinese character, it might choose a japanese font for
393display. Subsequent japanese characters will use that font. Now, many
394chinese characters aren't represented in japanese fonts, so when the first
395non-japanese character comes up, rxvt-unicode will look for a chinese font
396-- unfortunately at this point, it will still use the japanese font for
397chinese characters that are also in the japanese font.
398
399The workaround is easy: just tag a chinese font at the end of your font
400list (see the previous question). The key is to view the font list as
401a preference list: If you expect more japanese, list a japanese font
402first. If you expect more chinese, put a chinese font first.
403
404In the future it might be possible to switch language preferences at
405runtime (the internal data structure has no problem with using different
406fonts for the same character at the same time, but no interface for this
407has been designed yet).
408
409Until then, you might get away with switching fonts at runtime (see L<Can
410I switch the fonts at runtime?> later in this document).
411
412=item Why does rxvt-unicode sometimes leave pixel droppings?
413
414Most fonts were not designed for terminal use, which means that character
415size varies a lot. A font that is otherwise fine for terminal use might
416contain some characters that are simply too wide. Rxvt-unicode will avoid
417these characters. For characters that are just "a bit" too wide a special
418"careful" rendering mode is used that redraws adjacent characters.
419
420All of this requires that fonts do not lie about character sizes,
421however: Xft fonts often draw glyphs larger than their acclaimed bounding
422box, and rxvt-unicode has no way of detecting this (the correct way is to
423ask for the character bounding box, which unfortunately is wrong in these
424cases). 996locales).
425 997
426It's not clear (to me at least), wether this is a bug in Xft, freetype, 998Rxvt-unicode uses the C<LC_CTYPE> locale category to select encoding. All
427or the respective font. If you encounter this problem you might try using 999programs doing the same (that is, most) will automatically agree in the
428the C<-lsp> option to give the font more height. If that doesn't work, you 1000interpretation of characters.
429might be forced to use a different font.
430 1001
431All of this is not a problem when using X11 core fonts, as their bounding 1002Unfortunately, there is no system-independent way to select locales, nor
432box data is correct. 1003is there a standard on how locale specifiers will look like.
433 1004
1005On most systems, the content of the C<LC_CTYPE> environment variable
1006contains an arbitrary string which corresponds to an already-installed
1007locale. Common names for locales are C<en_US.UTF-8>, C<de_DE.ISO-8859-15>,
1008C<ja_JP.EUC-JP>, i.e. C<language_country.encoding>, but other forms
1009(i.e. C<de> or C<german>) are also common.
1010
1011Rxvt-unicode ignores all other locale categories, and except for
1012the encoding, ignores country or language-specific settings,
1013i.e. C<de_DE.UTF-8> and C<ja_JP.UTF-8> are the normally same to
1014rxvt-unicode.
1015
1016If you want to use a specific encoding you have to make sure you start
1017rxvt-unicode with the correct C<LC_CTYPE> category.
1018
1019=head3 Can I switch locales at runtime?
1020
1021Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which sets
1022rxvt-unicode's idea of C<LC_CTYPE>.
1023
1024 printf '\e]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
1025
1026See also the previous answer.
1027
1028Sometimes this capability is rather handy when you want to work in
1029one locale (e.g. C<de_DE.UTF-8>) but some programs don't support it
1030(e.g. UTF-8). For example, I use this script to start C<xjdic>, which
1031first switches to a locale supported by xjdic and back later:
1032
1033 printf '\e]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
1034 xjdic -js
1035 printf '\e]701;%s\007' de_DE.UTF-8
1036
1037You can also use xterm's C<luit> program, which usually works fine, except
1038for some locales where character width differs between program- and
1039rxvt-unicode-locales.
1040
1041=head3 I have problems getting my input method working.
1042
1043Try a search engine, as this is slightly different for every input method server.
1044
1045Here is a checklist:
1046
1047=over 4
1048
1049=item - Make sure your locale I<and> the imLocale are supported on your OS.
1050
1051Try C<locale -a> or check the documentation for your OS.
1052
1053=item - Make sure your locale or imLocale matches a locale supported by your XIM.
1054
1055For example, B<kinput2> does not support UTF-8 locales, you should use
1056C<ja_JP.EUC-JP> or equivalent.
1057
1058=item - Make sure your XIM server is actually running.
1059
1060=item - Make sure the C<XMODIFIERS> environment variable is set correctly when I<starting> rxvt-unicode.
1061
1062When you want to use e.g. B<kinput2>, it must be set to
1063C<@im=kinput2>. For B<scim>, use C<@im=SCIM>. Youc an see what input
1064method servers are running with this command:
1065
1066 xprop -root XIM_SERVERS
1067
1068=item
1069
1070=back
1071
1072=head3 My input method wants <some encoding> but I want UTF-8, what can I do?
1073
1074You can specify separate locales for the input method and the rest of the
1075terminal, using the resource C<imlocale>:
1076
1077 URxvt.imlocale: ja_JP.EUC-JP
1078
1079Now you can start your terminal with C<LC_CTYPE=ja_JP.UTF-8> and still
1080use your input method. Please note, however, that, depending on your Xlib
1081version, you may not be able to input characters outside C<EUC-JP> in a
1082normal way then, as your input method limits you.
1083
1084=head3 Rxvt-unicode crashes when the X Input Method changes or exits.
1085
1086Unfortunately, this is unavoidable, as the XIM protocol is racy by
1087design. Applications can avoid some crashes at the expense of memory
1088leaks, and Input Methods can avoid some crashes by careful ordering at
1089exit time. B<kinput2> (and derived input methods) generally succeeds,
1090while B<SCIM> (or similar input methods) fails. In the end, however,
1091crashes cannot be completely avoided even if both sides cooperate.
1092
1093So the only workaround is not to kill your Input Method Servers.
1094
1095
1096=head2 Operating Systems / Package Maintaining
1097
1098=head3 I am using Debian GNU/Linux and have a problem...
1099
1100The Debian GNU/Linux package of rxvt-unicode in sarge contains large
1101patches that considerably change the behaviour of rxvt-unicode (but
1102unfortunately this notice has been removed). Before reporting a bug to
1103the original rxvt-unicode author please download and install the genuine
1104version (L<http://software.schmorp.de#rxvt-unicode>) and try to reproduce
1105the problem. If you cannot, chances are that the problems are specific to
1106Debian GNU/Linux, in which case it should be reported via the Debian Bug
1107Tracking System (use C<reportbug> to report the bug).
1108
1109For other problems that also affect the Debian package, you can and
1110probably should use the Debian BTS, too, because, after all, it's also a
1111bug in the Debian version and it serves as a reminder for other users that
1112might encounter the same issue.
1113
1114=head3 I am maintaining rxvt-unicode for distribution/OS XXX, any recommendation?
1115
1116You should build one binary with the default options. F<configure>
1117now enables most useful options, and the trend goes to making them
1118runtime-switchable, too, so there is usually no drawback to enbaling them,
1119except higher disk and possibly memory usage. The perl interpreter should
1120be enabled, as important functionality (menus, selection, likely more in
1121the future) depends on it.
1122
1123You should not overwrite the C<perl-ext-common> snd C<perl-ext> resources
1124system-wide (except maybe with C<defaults>). This will result in useful
1125behaviour. If your distribution aims at low memory, add an empty
1126C<perl-ext-common> resource to the app-defaults file. This will keep the
1127perl interpreter disabled until the user enables it.
1128
1129If you can/want build more binaries, I recommend building a minimal
1130one with C<--disable-everything> (very useful) and a maximal one with
1131C<--enable-everything> (less useful, it will be very big due to a lot of
1132encodings built-in that increase download times and are rarely used).
1133
1134=head3 I need to make it setuid/setgid to support utmp/ptys on my OS, is this safe?
1135
1136It should be, starting with release 7.1. You are encouraged to properly
1137install urxvt with privileges necessary for your OS now.
1138
1139When rxvt-unicode detects that it runs setuid or setgid, it will fork
1140into a helper process for privileged operations (pty handling on some
1141systems, utmp/wtmp/lastlog handling on others) and drop privileges
1142immediately. This is much safer than most other terminals that keep
1143privileges while running (but is more relevant to urxvt, as it contains
1144things as perl interpreters, which might be "helpful" to attackers).
1145
1146This forking is done as the very first within main(), which is very early
1147and reduces possible bugs to initialisation code run before main(), or
1148things like the dynamic loader of your system, which should result in very
1149little risk.
1150
434=item On Solaris 9, many line-drawing characters are too wide. 1151=head3 On Solaris 9, many line-drawing characters are too wide.
435 1152
436Seems to be a known bug, read 1153Seems to be a known bug, read
437L<http://nixdoc.net/files/forum/about34198.html>. Some people use the 1154L<http://nixdoc.net/files/forum/about34198.html>. Some people use the
438following ugly workaround to get non-double-wide-characters working: 1155following ugly workaround to get non-double-wide-characters working:
439 1156
440 #define wcwidth(x) wcwidth(x) > 1 ? 1 : wcwidth(x) 1157 #define wcwidth(x) wcwidth(x) > 1 ? 1 : wcwidth(x)
441 1158
442=item My Compose (Multi_key) key is no longer working.
443
444The most common causes for this are that either your locale is not set
445correctly, or you specified a B<preeditStyle> that is not supported by
446your input method. For example, if you specified B<OverTheSpot> and
447your input method (e.g. the default input method handling Compose keys)
448does not support this (for instance because it is not visual), then
449rxvt-unicode will continue without an input method.
450
451In this case either do not specify a B<preeditStyle> or specify more than
452one pre-edit style, such as B<OverTheSpot,Root,None>.
453
454=item I cannot type C<Ctrl-Shift-2> to get an ASCII NUL character due to ISO 14755
455
456Either try C<Ctrl-2> alone (it often is mapped to ASCII NUL even on
457international keyboards) or simply use ISO 14755 support to your
458advantage, typing <Ctrl-Shift-0> to get a ASCII NUL. This works for other
459codes, too, such as C<Ctrl-Shift-1-d> to type the default telnet escape
460character and so on.
461
462=item How can I keep rxvt-unicode from using reverse video so much?
463
464First of all, make sure you are running with the right terminal settings
465(C<TERM=rxvt-unicode>), which will get rid of most of these effects. Then
466make sure you have specified colours for italic and bold, as otherwise
467rxvt-unicode might use reverse video to simulate the effect:
468
469 URxvt.colorBD: white
470 URxvt.colorIT: green
471
472=item Some programs assume totally weird colours (red instead of blue), how can I fix that?
473
474For some unexplainable reason, some rare programs assume a very weird
475colour palette when confronted with a terminal with more than the standard
4768 colours (rxvt-unicode supports 88). The right fix is, of course, to fix
477these programs not to assume non-ISO colours without very good reasons.
478
479In the meantime, you can either edit your C<rxvt-unicode> terminfo
480definition to only claim 8 colour support or use C<TERM=rxvt>, which will
481fix colours but keep you from using other rxvt-unicode features.
482
483=item I am on FreeBSD and rxvt-unicode does not seem to work at all. 1159=head3 I am on FreeBSD and rxvt-unicode does not seem to work at all.
484 1160
485Rxvt-unicode requires the symbol C<__STDC_ISO_10646__> to be defined 1161Rxvt-unicode requires the symbol C<__STDC_ISO_10646__> to be defined
486in your compile environment, or an implementation that implements it, 1162in your compile environment, or an implementation that implements it,
487wether it defines the symbol or not. C<__STDC_ISO_10646__> requires that 1163wether it defines the symbol or not. C<__STDC_ISO_10646__> requires that
488B<wchar_t> is represented as unicode. 1164B<wchar_t> is represented as unicode.
510 1186
511The rxvt-unicode author insists that the right way to fix this is in the 1187The rxvt-unicode author insists that the right way to fix this is in the
512system libraries once and for all, instead of forcing every app to carry 1188system libraries once and for all, instead of forcing every app to carry
513complete replacements for them :) 1189complete replacements for them :)
514 1190
515=item I use Solaris 9 and it doesn't compile/work/etc. 1191=head3 I use Solaris 9 and it doesn't compile/work/etc.
516 1192
517Try the diff in F<doc/solaris9.patch> as a base. It fixes the worst 1193Try the diff in F<doc/solaris9.patch> as a base. It fixes the worst
518problems with C<wcwidth> and a compile problem. 1194problems with C<wcwidth> and a compile problem.
519 1195
520=item How can I use rxvt-unicode under cygwin? 1196=head3 How can I use rxvt-unicode under cygwin?
521 1197
522rxvt-unicode should compile and run out of the box on cygwin, using 1198rxvt-unicode should compile and run out of the box on cygwin, using
523the X11 libraries that come with cygwin. libW11 emulation is no 1199the X11 libraries that come with cygwin. libW11 emulation is no
524longer supported (and makes no sense, either, as it only supported a 1200longer supported (and makes no sense, either, as it only supported a
525single font). I recommend starting the X-server in C<-multiwindow> or 1201single font). I recommend starting the X-server in C<-multiwindow> or
528 1204
529At the time of this writing, cygwin didn't seem to support any multi-byte 1205At the time of this writing, cygwin didn't seem to support any multi-byte
530encodings (you might try C<LC_CTYPE=C-UTF-8>), so you are likely limited 1206encodings (you might try C<LC_CTYPE=C-UTF-8>), so you are likely limited
531to 8-bit encodings. 1207to 8-bit encodings.
532 1208
533=item How does rxvt-unicode determine the encoding to use?
534
535=item Is there an option to switch encodings?
536
537Unlike some other terminals, rxvt-unicode has no encoding switch, and no
538specific "utf-8" mode, such as xterm. In fact, it doesn't even know about
539UTF-8 or any other encodings with respect to terminal I/O.
540
541The reasons is that there exists a perfectly fine mechanism for selecting
542the encoding, doing I/O and (most important) communicating this to all
543applications so everybody agrees on character properties such as width
544and code number. This mechanism is the I<locale>. Applications not using
545that info will have problems (for example, C<xterm> gets the width of
546characters wrong as it uses it's own, locale-independent table under all
547locales).
548
549Rxvt-unicode uses the C<LC_CTYPE> locale category to select encoding. All
550programs doing the same (that is, most) will automatically agree in the
551interpretation of characters.
552
553Unfortunately, there is no system-independent way to select locales, nor
554is there a standard on how locale specifiers will look like.
555
556On most systems, the content of the C<LC_CTYPE> environment variable
557contains an arbitrary string which corresponds to an already-installed
558locale. Common names for locales are C<en_US.UTF-8>, C<de_DE.ISO-8859-15>,
559C<ja_JP.EUC-JP>, i.e. C<language_country.encoding>, but other forms
560(i.e. C<de> or C<german>) are also common.
561
562Rxvt-unicode ignores all other locale categories, and except for
563the encoding, ignores country or language-specific settings,
564i.e. C<de_DE.UTF-8> and C<ja_JP.UTF-8> are the normally same to
565rxvt-unicode.
566
567If you want to use a specific encoding you have to make sure you start
568rxvt-unicode with the correct C<LC_CTYPE> category.
569
570=item Can I switch locales at runtime?
571
572Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which sets
573rxvt-unicode's idea of C<LC_CTYPE>.
574
575 printf '\e]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
576
577See also the previous answer.
578
579Sometimes this capability is rather handy when you want to work in
580one locale (e.g. C<de_DE.UTF-8>) but some programs don't support it
581(e.g. UTF-8). For example, I use this script to start C<xjdic>, which
582first switches to a locale supported by xjdic and back later:
583
584 printf '\e]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS
585 xjdic -js
586 printf '\e]701;%s\007' de_DE.UTF-8
587
588You can also use xterm's C<luit> program, which usually works fine, except
589for some locales where character width differs between program- and
590rxvt-unicode-locales.
591
592=item Can I switch the fonts at runtime?
593
594Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which has the same
595effect as using the C<-fn> switch, and takes effect immediately:
596
597 printf '\e]50;%s\007' "9x15bold,xft:Kochi Gothic"
598
599This is useful if you e.g. work primarily with japanese (and prefer a
600japanese font), but you have to switch to chinese temporarily, where
601japanese fonts would only be in your way.
602
603You can think of this as a kind of manual ISO-2022 switching.
604
605=item Why do italic characters look as if clipped?
606
607Many fonts have difficulties with italic characters and hinting. For
608example, the otherwise very nicely hinted font C<xft:Bitstream Vera Sans
609Mono> completely fails in it's italic face. A workaround might be to
610enable freetype autohinting, i.e. like this:
611
612 URxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true
613 URxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true
614
615=item My input method wants <some encoding> but I want UTF-8, what can I do?
616
617You can specify separate locales for the input method and the rest of the
618terminal, using the resource C<imlocale>:
619
620 URxvt.imlocale: ja_JP.EUC-JP
621
622Now you can start your terminal with C<LC_CTYPE=ja_JP.UTF-8> and still
623use your input method. Please note, however, that you will not be able to
624input characters outside C<EUC-JP> in a normal way then, as your input
625method limits you.
626
627=item Rxvt-unicode crashes when the X Input Method changes or exits.
628
629Unfortunately, this is unavoidable, as the XIM protocol is racy by
630design. Applications can avoid some crashes at the expense of memory
631leaks, and Input Methods can avoid some crashes by careful ordering at
632exit time. B<kinput2> (and derived input methods) generally succeeds,
633while B<SCIM> (or similar input methods) fails. In the end, however,
634crashes cannot be completely avoided even if both sides cooperate.
635
636So the only workaround is not to kill your Input Method Servers.
637
638=item Rxvt-unicode uses gobs of memory, how can I reduce that?
639
640Rxvt-unicode tries to obey the rule of not charging you for something you
641don't use. One thing you should try is to configure out all settings that
642you don't need, for example, Xft support is a resource hog by design,
643when used. Compiling it out ensures that no Xft font will be loaded
644accidentally when rxvt-unicode tries to find a font for your characters.
645
646Also, many people (me included) like large windows and even larger
647scrollback buffers: Without C<--enable-unicode3>, rxvt-unicode will use
6486 bytes per screen cell. For a 160x?? window this amounts to almost a
649kilobyte per line. A scrollback buffer of 10000 lines will then (if full)
650use 10 Megabytes of memory. With C<--enable-unicode3> it gets worse, as
651rxvt-unicode then uses 8 bytes per screen cell.
652
653=item Can I speed up Xft rendering somehow?
654
655Yes, the most obvious way to speed it up is to avoid Xft entirely, as
656it is simply slow. If you still want Xft fonts you might try to disable
657antialiasing (by appending C<:antialias=false>), which saves lots of
658memory and also speeds up rendering considerably.
659
660=item Rxvt-unicode doesn't seem to anti-alias its fonts, what is wrong?
661
662Rxvt-unicode will use whatever you specify as a font. If it needs to
663fall back to it's default font search list it will prefer X11 core
664fonts, because they are small and fast, and then use Xft fonts. It has
665antialiasing disabled for most of them, because the author thinks they
666look best that way.
667
668If you want antialiasing, you have to specify the fonts manually.
669
670=item Mouse cut/paste suddenly no longer works.
671
672Make sure that mouse reporting is actually turned off since killing
673some editors prematurely may leave the mouse in mouse report mode. I've
674heard that tcsh may use mouse reporting unless it otherwise specified. A
675quick check is to see if cut/paste works when the Alt or Shift keys are
676depressed.
677
678=item What's with this bold/blink stuff?
679
680If no bold colour is set via C<colorBD:>, bold will invert text using the
681standard foreground colour.
682
683For the standard background colour, blinking will actually make the
684text blink when compiled with C<--enable-blinking>. with standard
685colours. Without C<--enable-blinking>, the blink attribute will be
686ignored.
687
688On ANSI colours, bold/blink attributes are used to set high-intensity
689foreground/background colors.
690
691color0-7 are the low-intensity colors.
692
693color8-15 are the corresponding high-intensity colors.
694
695=item I don't like the screen colors. How do I change them?
696
697You can change the screen colors at run-time using F<~/.Xdefaults>
698resources (or as long-options).
699
700Here are values that are supposed to resemble a VGA screen,
701including the murky brown that passes for low-intensity yellow:
702
703 URxvt.color0: #000000
704 URxvt.color1: #A80000
705 URxvt.color2: #00A800
706 URxvt.color3: #A8A800
707 URxvt.color4: #0000A8
708 URxvt.color5: #A800A8
709 URxvt.color6: #00A8A8
710 URxvt.color7: #A8A8A8
711
712 URxvt.color8: #000054
713 URxvt.color9: #FF0054
714 URxvt.color10: #00FF54
715 URxvt.color11: #FFFF54
716 URxvt.color12: #0000FF
717 URxvt.color13: #FF00FF
718 URxvt.color14: #00FFFF
719 URxvt.color15: #FFFFFF
720
721And here is a more complete set of non-standard colors described (not by
722me) as "pretty girly".
723
724 URxvt.cursorColor: #dc74d1
725 URxvt.pointerColor: #dc74d1
726 URxvt.background: #0e0e0e
727 URxvt.foreground: #4ad5e1
728 URxvt.color0: #000000
729 URxvt.color8: #8b8f93
730 URxvt.color1: #dc74d1
731 URxvt.color9: #dc74d1
732 URxvt.color2: #0eb8c7
733 URxvt.color10: #0eb8c7
734 URxvt.color3: #dfe37e
735 URxvt.color11: #dfe37e
736 URxvt.color5: #9e88f0
737 URxvt.color13: #9e88f0
738 URxvt.color6: #73f7ff
739 URxvt.color14: #73f7ff
740 URxvt.color7: #e1dddd
741 URxvt.color15: #e1dddd
742
743=item How can I start @@RXVT_NAME@@d in a race-free way?
744
745Try C<@@RXVT_NAME@@d -f -o>, which tells @@RXVT_NAME@@d to open the
746display, create the listening socket and then fork.
747
748=item What's with the strange Backspace/Delete key behaviour?
749
750Assuming that the physical Backspace key corresponds to the
751BackSpace keysym (not likely for Linux ... see the following
752question) there are two standard values that can be used for
753Backspace: C<^H> and C<^?>.
754
755Historically, either value is correct, but rxvt-unicode adopts the debian
756policy of using C<^?> when unsure, because it's the one only only correct
757choice :).
758
759Rxvt-unicode tries to inherit the current stty settings and uses the value
760of `erase' to guess the value for backspace. If rxvt-unicode wasn't
761started from a terminal (say, from a menu or by remote shell), then the
762system value of `erase', which corresponds to CERASE in <termios.h>, will
763be used (which may not be the same as your stty setting).
764
765For starting a new rxvt-unicode:
766
767 # use Backspace = ^H
768 $ stty erase ^H
769 $ @@RXVT_NAME@@
770
771 # use Backspace = ^?
772 $ stty erase ^?
773 $ @@RXVT_NAME@@
774
775Toggle with C<ESC [ 36 h> / C<ESC [ 36 l>.
776
777For an existing rxvt-unicode:
778
779 # use Backspace = ^H
780 $ stty erase ^H
781 $ echo -n "^[[36h"
782
783 # use Backspace = ^?
784 $ stty erase ^?
785 $ echo -n "^[[36l"
786
787This helps satisfy some of the Backspace discrepancies that occur, but
788if you use Backspace = C<^H>, make sure that the termcap/terminfo value
789properly reflects that.
790
791The Delete key is a another casualty of the ill-defined Backspace problem.
792To avoid confusion between the Backspace and Delete keys, the Delete
793key has been assigned an escape sequence to match the vt100 for Execute
794(C<ESC [ 3 ~>) and is in the supplied termcap/terminfo.
795
796Some other Backspace problems:
797
798some editors use termcap/terminfo,
799some editors (vim I'm told) expect Backspace = ^H,
800GNU Emacs (and Emacs-like editors) use ^H for help.
801
802Perhaps someday this will all be resolved in a consistent manner.
803
804=item I don't like the key-bindings. How do I change them?
805
806There are some compile-time selections available via configure. Unless
807you have run "configure" with the C<--disable-resources> option you can
808use the `keysym' resource to alter the keystrings associated with keysyms.
809
810Here's an example for a URxvt session started using C<@@RXVT_NAME@@ -name URxvt>
811
812 URxvt.keysym.Home: \033[1~
813 URxvt.keysym.End: \033[4~
814 URxvt.keysym.C-apostrophe: \033<C-'>
815 URxvt.keysym.C-slash: \033<C-/>
816 URxvt.keysym.C-semicolon: \033<C-;>
817 URxvt.keysym.C-grave: \033<C-`>
818 URxvt.keysym.C-comma: \033<C-,>
819 URxvt.keysym.C-period: \033<C-.>
820 URxvt.keysym.C-0x60: \033<C-`>
821 URxvt.keysym.C-Tab: \033<C-Tab>
822 URxvt.keysym.C-Return: \033<C-Return>
823 URxvt.keysym.S-Return: \033<S-Return>
824 URxvt.keysym.S-space: \033<S-Space>
825 URxvt.keysym.M-Up: \033<M-Up>
826 URxvt.keysym.M-Down: \033<M-Down>
827 URxvt.keysym.M-Left: \033<M-Left>
828 URxvt.keysym.M-Right: \033<M-Right>
829 URxvt.keysym.M-C-0: list \033<M-C- 0123456789 >
830 URxvt.keysym.M-C-a: list \033<M-C- abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz >
831 URxvt.keysym.F12: command:\033]701;zh_CN.GBK\007
832
833See some more examples in the documentation for the B<keysym> resource.
834
835=item I'm using keyboard model XXX that has extra Prior/Next/Insert keys.
836How do I make use of them? For example, the Sun Keyboard type 4
837has the following mappings that rxvt-unicode doesn't recognize.
838
839 KP_Insert == Insert
840 F22 == Print
841 F27 == Home
842 F29 == Prior
843 F33 == End
844 F35 == Next
845
846Rather than have rxvt-unicode try to accommodate all the various possible
847keyboard mappings, it is better to use `xmodmap' to remap the keys as
848required for your particular machine.
849
850=item How do I distinguish wether I'm running rxvt-unicode or a regular xterm?
851I need this to decide about setting colors etc.
852
853rxvt and rxvt-unicode always export the variable "COLORTERM", so you can
854check and see if that is set. Note that several programs, JED, slrn,
855Midnight Commander automatically check this variable to decide whether or
856not to use color.
857
858=item How do I set the correct, full IP address for the DISPLAY variable?
859
860If you've compiled rxvt-unicode with DISPLAY_IS_IP and have enabled
861insecure mode then it is possible to use the following shell script
862snippets to correctly set the display. If your version of rxvt-unicode
863wasn't also compiled with ESCZ_ANSWER (as assumed in these snippets) then
864the COLORTERM variable can be used to distinguish rxvt-unicode from a
865regular xterm.
866
867Courtesy of Chuck Blake <cblake@BBN.COM> with the following shell script
868snippets:
869
870 # Bourne/Korn/POSIX family of shells:
871 [ ${TERM:-foo} = foo ] && TERM=xterm # assume an xterm if we don't know
872 if [ ${TERM:-foo} = xterm ]; then
873 stty -icanon -echo min 0 time 15 # see if enhanced rxvt or not
874 echo -n '^[Z'
875 read term_id
876 stty icanon echo
877 if [ ""${term_id} = '^[[?1;2C' -a ${DISPLAY:-foo} = foo ]; then
878 echo -n '^[[7n' # query the rxvt we are in for the DISPLAY string
879 read DISPLAY # set it in our local shell
880 fi
881 fi
882
883=item How do I compile the manual pages for myself?
884
885You need to have a recent version of perl installed as F</usr/bin/perl>,
886one that comes with F<pod2man>, F<pod2text> and F<pod2html>. Then go to
887the doc subdirectory and enter C<make alldoc>.
888
889=item My question isn't answered here, can I ask a human?
890
891Before sending me mail, you could go to IRC: C<irc.freenode.net>,
892channel C<#rxvt-unicode> has some rxvt-unicode enthusiasts that might be
893interested in learning about new and exciting problems (but not FAQs :).
894
895=back
896
897=head1 RXVT TECHNICAL REFERENCE 1209=head1 RXVT-UNICODE TECHNICAL REFERENCE
898
899=head1 DESCRIPTION
900 1210
901The rest of this document describes various technical aspects of 1211The rest of this document describes various technical aspects of
902B<rxvt-unicode>. First the description of supported command sequences, 1212B<rxvt-unicode>. First the description of supported command sequences,
903followed by pixmap support and last by a description of all features 1213followed by pixmap support and last by a description of all features
904selectable at C<configure> time. 1214selectable at C<configure> time.
905 1215
906=head1 Definitions 1216=head2 Definitions
907 1217
908=over 4 1218=over 4
909 1219
910=item B<< C<c> >> 1220=item B<< C<c> >>
911 1221
929 1239
930A text parameter composed of printable characters. 1240A text parameter composed of printable characters.
931 1241
932=back 1242=back
933 1243
934=head1 Values 1244=head2 Values
935 1245
936=over 4 1246=over 4
937 1247
938=item B<< C<ENQ> >> 1248=item B<< C<ENQ> >>
939 1249
982 1292
983Space Character 1293Space Character
984 1294
985=back 1295=back
986 1296
987=head1 Escape Sequences 1297=head2 Escape Sequences
988 1298
989=over 4 1299=over 4
990 1300
991=item B<< C<ESC # 8> >> 1301=item B<< C<ESC # 8> >>
992 1302
1090 1400
1091=back 1401=back
1092 1402
1093X<CSI> 1403X<CSI>
1094 1404
1095=head1 CSI (Command Sequence Introducer) Sequences 1405=head2 CSI (Command Sequence Introducer) Sequences
1096 1406
1097=over 4 1407=over 4
1098 1408
1099=item B<< C<ESC [ Ps @> >> 1409=item B<< C<ESC [ Ps @> >>
1100 1410
1370 1680
1371=back 1681=back
1372 1682
1373X<PrivateModes> 1683X<PrivateModes>
1374 1684
1375=head1 DEC Private Modes 1685=head2 DEC Private Modes
1376 1686
1377=over 4 1687=over 4
1378 1688
1379=item B<< C<ESC [ ? Pm h> >> 1689=item B<< C<ESC [ ? Pm h> >>
1380 1690
1644 1954
1645=back 1955=back
1646 1956
1647X<XTerm> 1957X<XTerm>
1648 1958
1649=head1 XTerm Operating System Commands 1959=head2 XTerm Operating System Commands
1650 1960
1651=over 4 1961=over 4
1652 1962
1653=item B<< C<ESC ] Ps;Pt ST> >> 1963=item B<< C<ESC ] Ps;Pt ST> >>
1654 1964
1675 B<< C<Ps = 46> >> Change Log File to B<< C<Pt> >> I<unimplemented> 1985 B<< C<Ps = 46> >> Change Log File to B<< C<Pt> >> I<unimplemented>
1676 B<< C<Ps = 49> >> Change default background colour to B<< C<Pt> >>. 1986 B<< C<Ps = 49> >> Change default background colour to B<< C<Pt> >>.
1677 B<< C<Ps = 50> >> Set fontset to B<< C<Pt> >>, with the following special values of B<< C<Pt> >> (B<rxvt>) B<< C<#+n> >> change up B<< C<n> >> B<< C<#-n> >> change down B<< C<n> >> if B<< C<n> >> is missing of 0, a value of 1 is used I<empty> change to font0 B<< C<n> >> change to font B<< C<n> >> 1987 B<< C<Ps = 50> >> Set fontset to B<< C<Pt> >>, with the following special values of B<< C<Pt> >> (B<rxvt>) B<< C<#+n> >> change up B<< C<n> >> B<< C<#-n> >> change down B<< C<n> >> if B<< C<n> >> is missing of 0, a value of 1 is used I<empty> change to font0 B<< C<n> >> change to font B<< C<n> >>
1678 B<< C<Ps = 55> >> Log all scrollback buffer and all of screen to B<< C<Pt> >> 1988 B<< C<Ps = 55> >> Log all scrollback buffer and all of screen to B<< C<Pt> >>
1679 B<< C<Ps = 701> >> Change current locale to B<< C<Pt> >>, or, if B<< C<Pt> >> is B<< C<?> >>, return the current locale (Compile frills). 1989 B<< C<Ps = 701> >> Change current locale to B<< C<Pt> >>, or, if B<< C<Pt> >> is B<< C<?> >>, return the current locale (Compile frills).
1990 B<< C<Ps = 702> >> Request version if B<< C<Pt> >> is B<< C<?> >>, returning C<rxvt-unicode>, the resource name, the major and minor version numbers, e.g. C<ESC ] 702 ; rxvt-unicode ; urxvt ; 7 ; 4 ST>.
1680 B<< C<Ps = 704> >> Change colour of italic characters to B<< C<Pt> >> 1991 B<< C<Ps = 704> >> Change colour of italic characters to B<< C<Pt> >>
1681 B<< C<Ps = 705> >> Change background pixmap tint colour to B<< C<Pt> >> (Compile transparency). 1992 B<< C<Ps = 705> >> Change background pixmap tint colour to B<< C<Pt> >> (Compile transparency).
1682 B<< C<Ps = 706> >> Change colour of bold characters to B<< C<Pt> >> 1993 B<< C<Ps = 706> >> Change colour of bold characters to B<< C<Pt> >>
1683 B<< C<Ps = 707> >> Change colour of underlined characters to B<< C<Pt> >> 1994 B<< C<Ps = 707> >> Change colour of underlined characters to B<< C<Pt> >>
1684 B<< C<Ps = 710> >> Set normal fontset to B<< C<Pt> >>. Same as C<Ps = 50>. 1995 B<< C<Ps = 710> >> Set normal fontset to B<< C<Pt> >>. Same as C<Ps = 50>.
1691 2002
1692=end table 2003=end table
1693 2004
1694=back 2005=back
1695 2006
1696X<XPM>
1697
1698=head1 XPM 2007=head1 XPM
1699 2008
1700For the XPM XTerm escape sequence B<< C<ESC ] 20 ; Pt ST> >> then value 2009For the XPM XTerm escape sequence B<< C<ESC ] 20 ; Pt ST> >> then value
1701of B<< C<Pt> >> can be the name of the background pixmap followed by a 2010of B<< C<Pt> >> can be the name of the background pixmap followed by a
1702sequence of scaling/positioning commands separated by semi-colons. The 2011sequence of scaling/positioning commands separated by semi-colons. The
1799=begin table 2108=begin table
1800 2109
1801 4 Shift 2110 4 Shift
1802 8 Meta 2111 8 Meta
1803 16 Control 2112 16 Control
1804 32 Double Click I<(Rxvt extension)> 2113 32 Double Click I<(rxvt extension)>
1805 2114
1806=end table 2115=end table
1807 2116
1808Col = B<< C<< <x> - SPACE >> >> 2117Col = B<< C<< <x> - SPACE >> >>
1809 2118
1947alternative input methods (e.g. kinput2) and will also correctly 2256alternative input methods (e.g. kinput2) and will also correctly
1948set up the input for people using dead keys or compose keys. 2257set up the input for people using dead keys or compose keys.
1949 2258
1950=item --enable-unicode3 (default: off) 2259=item --enable-unicode3 (default: off)
1951 2260
2261Recommended to stay off unless you really need non-BMP characters.
2262
1952Enable direct support for displaying unicode codepoints above 2263Enable direct support for displaying unicode codepoints above
195365535 (the basic multilingual page). This increases storage 226465535 (the basic multilingual page). This increases storage
1954requirements per character from 2 to 4 bytes. X11 fonts do not yet 2265requirements per character from 2 to 4 bytes. X11 fonts do not yet
1955support these extra characters, but Xft does. 2266support these extra characters, but Xft does.
1956 2267
1966composite characters. This is required for proper viewing of text 2277composite characters. This is required for proper viewing of text
1967where accents are encoded as seperate unicode characters. This is 2278where accents are encoded as seperate unicode characters. This is
1968done by using precomposited characters when available or creating 2279done by using precomposited characters when available or creating
1969new pseudo-characters when no precomposed form exists. 2280new pseudo-characters when no precomposed form exists.
1970 2281
1971Without --enable-unicode3, the number of additional precomposed characters 2282Without --enable-unicode3, the number of additional precomposed
1972is rather limited (2048, if this is full, rxvt-unicode will use the 2283characters is somewhat limited (the 6400 private use characters will be
1973private use area, extending the number of combinations to 8448). With
1974--enable-unicode3, no practical limit exists. 2284(ab-)used). With --enable-unicode3, no practical limit exists.
1975 2285
1976This option will also enable storage (but not display) of characters 2286This option will also enable storage (but not display) of characters
1977beyond plane 0 (>65535) when --enable-unicode3 was not specified. 2287beyond plane 0 (>65535) when --enable-unicode3 was not specified.
1978 2288
1979The combining table also contains entries for arabic presentation forms, 2289The combining table also contains entries for arabic presentation forms,
1980but these are not currently used. Bug me if you want these to be used (and 2290but these are not currently used. Bug me if you want these to be used (and
1981tell me how these are to be used...). 2291tell me how these are to be used...).
1982 2292
1983=item --enable-fallback(=CLASS) (default: Rxvt) 2293=item --enable-fallback(=CLASS) (default: Rxvt)
1984 2294
1985When reading resource settings, also read settings for class CLASS. To disable resource fallback use --disable-fallback. 2295When reading resource settings, also read settings for class CLASS. To
2296disable resource fallback use --disable-fallback.
1986 2297
1987=item --with-res-name=NAME (default: urxvt) 2298=item --with-res-name=NAME (default: urxvt)
1988 2299
1989Use the given name as default application name when 2300Use the given name as default application name when
1990reading resources. Specify --with-res-name=rxvt to replace rxvt. 2301reading resources. Specify --with-res-name=rxvt to replace rxvt.
2080 2391
2081 MWM-hints 2392 MWM-hints
2082 EWMH-hints (pid, utf8 names) and protocols (ping) 2393 EWMH-hints (pid, utf8 names) and protocols (ping)
2083 seperate underline colour (-underlineColor) 2394 seperate underline colour (-underlineColor)
2084 settable border widths and borderless switch (-w, -b, -bl) 2395 settable border widths and borderless switch (-w, -b, -bl)
2396 visual depth selection (-depth)
2085 settable extra linespacing /-lsp) 2397 settable extra linespacing /-lsp)
2086 iso-14755-2 and -3, and visual feedback 2398 iso-14755-2 and -3, and visual feedback
2087 backindex and forwardindex escape sequence
2088 window op and some xterm/OSC escape sequences
2089 tripleclickwords (-tcw) 2399 tripleclickwords (-tcw)
2090 settable insecure mode (-insecure) 2400 settable insecure mode (-insecure)
2091 keysym remapping support 2401 keysym remapping support
2092 cursor blinking and underline cursor (-cb, -uc) 2402 cursor blinking and underline cursor (-cb, -uc)
2093 XEmbed support (-embed) 2403 XEmbed support (-embed)
2094 user-pty (-pty-fd) 2404 user-pty (-pty-fd)
2095 hold on exit (-hold) 2405 hold on exit (-hold)
2096 skip builtin block graphics (-sbg) 2406 skip builtin block graphics (-sbg)
2407
2408It also enabled some non-essential features otherwise disabled, such as:
2409
2410 some round-trip time optimisations
2411 nearest color allocation on pseudocolor screens
2412 UTF8_STRING supporr for selection
2097 sgr modes 90..97 and 100..107 2413 sgr modes 90..97 and 100..107
2414 backindex and forwardindex escape sequences
2415 view change/zero scorllback esacpe sequences
2416 locale switching escape sequence
2417 window op and some xterm/OSC escape sequences
2418 rectangular selections
2419 trailing space removal for selections
2420 verbose X error handling
2098 2421
2099=item --enable-iso14755 (default: on) 2422=item --enable-iso14755 (default: on)
2100 2423
2101Enable extended ISO 14755 support (see @@RXVT_NAME@@(1), or 2424Enable extended ISO 14755 support (see @@RXVT_NAME@@(1), or
2102F<doc/rxvt.1.txt>). Basic support (section 5.1) is enabled by 2425F<doc/rxvt.1.txt>). Basic support (section 5.1) is enabled by
2123Remove support for mouse selection style like that of xterm. 2446Remove support for mouse selection style like that of xterm.
2124 2447
2125=item --enable-dmalloc (default: off) 2448=item --enable-dmalloc (default: off)
2126 2449
2127Use Gray Watson's malloc - which is good for debugging See 2450Use Gray Watson's malloc - which is good for debugging See
2128http://www.letters.com/dmalloc/ for details If you use either this or the 2451L<http://www.letters.com/dmalloc/> for details If you use either this or the
2129next option, you may need to edit src/Makefile after compiling to point 2452next option, you may need to edit src/Makefile after compiling to point
2130DINCLUDE and DLIB to the right places. 2453DINCLUDE and DLIB to the right places.
2131 2454
2132You can only use either this option and the following (should 2455You can only use either this option and the following (should
2133you use either) . 2456you use either) .
2145 2468
2146=item --enable-pointer-blank (default: on) 2469=item --enable-pointer-blank (default: on)
2147 2470
2148Add support to have the pointer disappear when typing or inactive. 2471Add support to have the pointer disappear when typing or inactive.
2149 2472
2150=item --enable-perl (default: off) 2473=item --enable-perl (default: on)
2151 2474
2152Enable an embedded perl interpreter. See the B<@@RXVT_NAME@@perl(3)> 2475Enable an embedded perl interpreter. See the B<@@RXVT_NAME@@perl(3)>
2153manpage (F<doc/rxvtperl.txt>) for more info on this feature, or the files 2476manpage (F<doc/rxvtperl.txt>) for more info on this feature, or the files
2154in F<src/perl-ext/> for the extensions that are installed by default. The 2477in F<src/perl-ext/> for the extensions that are installed by default. The
2155perl interpreter that is used can be specified via the C<PERL> environment 2478perl interpreter that is used can be specified via the C<PERL> environment

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