Hi, Storm, Fernando, All:
This has become a very long post. Be warned! <grin> I don't mind writing
it, and will gladly respond to more questions, because I believe it's my
obligation to share what I know and how I do things when people ask
about that. I'm only paying forward what others have done for me over
the years, after all.
I've sectioned this email to hopefully help organize the topics covered.
* My console launch script
The script is so dirt simple, I feel confident pasting it in line here.
Following the script, some comments in response to questions ...
<begin.script>
#!/bin/bash
for i in `seq 2 24`; do
openvt -f -c $i -u janina
done
<end.script>
First, some comments on using this script, before I go to answering
Storm's very good question ...
The script assumes a couple things:
* You're going to login on tty1 as your ordinary user. So, tty1 is
* already open, probably with Speakup and/or Brltty.
* You've added your ordinary user to visudo, probably with the
* setting that doesn't require a password for sudo, though it'd be
* OK with password as well. I just don't see the point in my home
* office of constantly prompting for passwords. It's different on
* my notebook on the road, where I use vlock -a as root when I
* step away from my machine.
* You've gone in and deleted any extra gettys under
* /etc/./systemd/system/getty.target.wants because you really only
* need the one for tty1. The above script handles the rest. I
* believe this is the Arch default, but may be different on other
* Linux distros.
For another way of getting this result, look at:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Automatic_login_to_virtual_console
Note that you may not need all 24, as Storm suggests. In fact I only use
12 in my Mac Airbook where I run Arch linux as a guest vm under VMware.
The reason I'm OK with only 12 on the Airbook is two fold. I don't do as
much, so can get away with fewer consoles, plus I find it hard enough
controlling the vm vs the Mac with mapped keys on a Mac laptop.
PS: By the way, I also autologin all my consoles on the vm. I figure the
Mac login at boot is sufficient to cover the guests, too. If you're
interested in how to do that, look at:
http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/42359/how-can-i-autologin-to-desktop-with-systemd
PPS: I'm likely to be selling my Airbook soon. I'm glad I put in the
time to learn how that environment works, but it's just not for me. I'd
keep it if running Linux in a vm on the Airbook was easier and more
reliable, but it just isn't, in my experience. The Airbook is incredibly
cool hardware, but I'm just not comfortable in the Apple ecosystem. It's
just not me, nor my style.
* Using screen
Storm has asked that I expressly answer why all the many consoles, why
not just use screen? It's a great question.
In truth, I do use screen. I use it extensively as I'll shortly
describe. There are many outstanding reasons for using screen, it's one
of the coolest apps available on the console, and I strongly recommend
learning it.
Here's just one "aw shucks" example. Late next week I'm getting on a
plane and traveling across the pond to attend a week long conference.
After checking into my hotel and pluggin in my laptop, I'll first figure
out how to get on line, preferably over a wired connection. Then, I'll
ssh into my data-center hosted server and resume several activities
right were I left off before leaving home. How's that possible? By
resuming an existing screen session. This is so important to me that I
always launch screen in a way that allows me to give my screen session a
human meaningful name:
Example:
I launch 10 mutt sessions using a particular .screenrc file set up
specifically to do that, with the command:
exec screen -U -S mutt_sessions -c /home/janina/.screenrc.mutt
So, when I traverse the planet and login from afar, I can resume all
those same sessions with a simple:
screen -A -x mutt_sessions
If I ever am unsure whether I've opened a particular screen session that
I routinely use and would likely have opened at some point, maybe
because I've recently rebooted my server, screen will happily tell me
what's open with the command:
screen -ls
Why 10 mutt sessions, you ask? Well, I have different folders that I
frequently access in those 10 sessions.
So, if I want to catch up on all my Linux lists, including this Orca
list and the Speakup list, I forst go to console 10 with Alt+F10 (or
Ctrl+Alt+F10 if I'm coming from the graphical environment). If my
computer folder was the last one I looked at in tty10, it's what will be
in front of me. But, if my last folder was my outbox, I then simply do
Alt+A followed by the digit 4 from the top row of the qwerty to get to
the computer folder.
As you may now have guessed, I have particular folders on Alt+a from 1
through 9 plus 0. The special mutt .screenrc file noted above
automagically sets all that up.
In fact when the openvt script above opens all those consoles, it also
tests for what tty it is, and whether there's already a screen on that
console. A long series of if then statements will then launch screen in
that tty with particular settings that I routinely need and use. I find
this approach awesome because it's fully predictable and reliable. No
hunting around for a lost window with Alt+TAB.
Here's my personal scema of ttys. I provide this simply to explain why
and how I actually do use 24 of them:
tty1 The first login, and the eventually home of the graphical
desktop with Orca. I've been using startx, but am going to investigate
the systemctl isolate command I uncovered yesterday on this very thread.
tty2 10 screen sessions including 5 instances of lynx, and an ssh to
my server on Ctrl+a 4 in order to access my irssi session with Talking
Arch. This is my "learn more about technology" console. It's home
directory, is ~/hwdev
tty3 Personal stuff like paratransit reservations, baseball standings
(Go Nats!), recipies, etc., etc. Every kind of personal stuff except
money.
tty4 Similar to tty2 and tty3, but having to do with music. This
default home folder is ~/music.
tty5 Ten screen consoles for my church activities. I'm the Music
Director in a church, so this one gets lots of activity regularly.
tty6 A root console. It's the exception to the openvt above. I always
login directly on this one as root because some commands won't allow a
sudo -i to work, believe it or not. They want an actual root login, not
a sudo.
tty7 My standards work, mostly W3C these days. As with tty2 above, it
includes an ssh into the data center server to access irssi to my
various W3C channels on Ctrl+a 4.
tty8 Another root, this time via sudo -i
tty9 A personal console with all my financial stuff.
tty10 My mutt as explained above.
tty11 Linphonec for phone calls.
tty12 Ten screen sessions around travel activity
tty13-16 Each is an ssh session to another machine, e.g. tty13 is an ssh
to my server, where I'm also running screen with 10 sessions.
tty17-20 More consoles about music work, usually without a screen
session.
tty21-24 Odds and ends, usually without a screen session, but might have
one in particular circumstances.
*A word about graphical desktops and how I use them
I suspect most Orca people do a lot more with Orca than I do. I have not
played with mate, nor with any of the other desktop managers already
mentioned in this thread. That's because I'm basically happy launching
apps from Alt+F2.
Mostly, I use Firefox, and even that I launch from a script in
/usr/local/bin because my first step is to login my LastPass
credentials.
I also use LibreOffice, but not really all that much. If I ever
seriously need a spread sheet, though, this will certainly change. I
also use gedit, especially when I want to copy content from some web
page, because I've not found a convenient way to copy from the gui to a
vim instance in a console.
Now that Joanie has sped up Thunderbird, I'll probably give it another
spin. But, I'm not very likely to abandon using mutt with Speakup
anytime soon, even if Thunderbird gets a permanent spot in my gui use,
just like I haven't abandoned Lynx in the console, despite all the time
I spend using Firefox.
I should give a plug to the xclip app. I use it alot, especially for
copying URLs between the desktop and the console.
So, the bottom line here is that I'm not actually using the gui as an
integrated environment. Point and click just isn't my metaphor for
effective computer use. Nor is Alt+TAB my metaphor for finding some
particular task I was working on. I smile when my colleagues on
teleconferences say, as they frequently do, "Wait a second, I lost that
window ..." I rarely lose my "windows," because they're anchored on
specific tty's.
So, trying out mate, or rat, or whatever, is on my curiosity list. I may
get to playing around with one of those, one of these days. It just
hasn't been my personal or business priority yet.
NOTE: There are all kinds of refinements for starting the gui using one,
or one of several desktop managers. I find the following doc helpful:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Start_X_at_login
* One additional comment
It's really, really important to learn how to search for, and how to
find on line documentation. I'm still learning, some 20 years after
first starting to use Unix/Linux. And, it's important to ask questions
on lists like this one, especially after you've tried to find answers
via on line docs. Just this week a long time colleague on the Speakup
list pointed me to some awesome ALSA documentation that I had completely
missed, even though I had searched long and hard.
Last, I want to put in a plug for Arch documentation. The quality of
Arch documentation was the first thing that attracted
me away from Fedora and to Arch. I used Arch docs for years as a Fedora
user before I actually switched to Arch on my local machines. My
data-center based server, opera.rednote.net, still runs Fedora, but
increasingly I'm solving problems by looking at Arch documentation.
Hope this long post is helpful!
Janina
Storm Dragon writes:
Howdy,
I am in fact blind. So much so that my computer doesn't
currently have a screen hooked up to it. I chose ratpoison
because it is extremely light weight, and thanks to a bit of
scripting, it is very accessible.
But now, I have a couple questions for Janina. First, can you
send me that script too? I'm just curious how it works/want to
learn from it. Second, have you ever heard of screen, and if so
why not use it? You don't need 24 consoles open when you can
have unlimited applications running in 1 console, plus a second
one for X. This is another reason why I chose ratpoison, it's a
very screen-like interface, so it makes X seem more like an
extention of the console.
Thanks
Storm
On Fri, Sep 09, 2016 at 09:34:15PM -0300, Fernando Botelho wrote:
Dear Janina,
it is great to hear from you. Thank you very much for your software
setup description.
I would indeed love to try the script you are using. Please let me know
how I may obtain it. Our experimental computer uses ARCH, if that makes
any difference.
Another detailed email sent earlier by Storm, kindly suggested a
software called RatPoison. However, you seem to be achieving the same
result with standard OS tools. Is the difference that RatPoison offers a
visually more appealing configuration or is it something else? I
automatically assumed that Storm was blind, but maybe he has low vision,
or maybe there is another aspect of using RatPoison that may have
attracted him to that solution. Any ideas?
Thanks again,
Fernando
On 09/09/2016 06:00 PM, Janina Sajka wrote:
Hi, Fernando:
The short answer is "yes."
The somewhat longer answer ...
You can have both environments active at the same time and simply switch
among them whenever you want to do that. You use CTRL+Alt plus one of
the function keys to switch around your various consoles. Note that, on
most distros by default, and certainly by design if you need to tweak
things, it's easy to have up to 24 consoles open at any time, because
the Ctrl+Alt to the left of the spacebar is treated differently from the
Ctrl+Alt to the right of the spacebar.
My setup is in fact that elaborate. And, yes, I really do use all 24
consoles. Actually, I personally use them in a fairly rigorous way, e.g.
my graphical desktop with Orca is always on Ctrl+Alt+F1, where as my
mutt email client is always on Ctrl+Alt+F10.
Special Note: You can dispense with the Ctrl key when switching among
text consoles. You need it only when exiting from the graphical desktop.
The classic Linux/Unix installation gives you 6 consoles. For my
purposes I've actually reduced this to one by default on boot. Then, I
use a script that calls the command openvt in a for loop to open
consoles 2 through 24 for me. I do it this way because it's actually
tedious to have to log in to each console by hand. I'd rather login
once, and let the script open my remaining consoles for me. Let me know
if you'd like this script.
PS: To get the text console as the default login you need to observe how
your distribution does that.
If your distribution uses systemd, you would, as root, do:
systemctl set-default multi-user.target
With the above executed successfully, the next time you
boot, you'll come to a text login screen on tty1.
Then, to launch the graphical environment, you could do:
startx
Or you might do:
systemctl isolate graphical.target
hth
Janina
Fernando Botelho writes:
Hi everyone,
I am trying to help someone with very unusual
requirements and the following
has come up:
On the F123 distro, and just about every other one I
have seen, one boots
into the graphical user interface and uses the Terminal on occasion.
My question is: is it just as easy and practical
for someone to boot into
the command line, use it with SpeakUp most of the
time, and then open Gnome
or Mate and use it with Orca for specific tasks?
Would switching back and
forth be as smooth as it is to jump into the Terminal from Gnome?
Thanks,
Fernando
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