~ubuntu-branches/ubuntu/jaunty/rxvt-unicode/jaunty-proposed : revision 10

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RXVT-UNICODE/URXVT FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

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Meta, Features & Commandline Issues

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My question isn't answered here, can I ask a human?

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Before sending me mail, you could go to IRC: "irc.freenode.net", channel

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"#rxvt-unicode" has some rxvt-unicode enthusiasts that might be

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interested in learning about new and exciting problems (but not FAQs :).

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Does it support tabs, can I have a tabbed rxvt-unicode?

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Beginning with version 7.3, there is a perl extension that implements a

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simple tabbed terminal. It is installed by default, so any of these

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should give you tabs:

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urxvt -pe tabbed

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URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,tabbed

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It will also work fine with tabbing functionality of many window

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managers or similar tabbing programs, and its embedding-features allow

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it to be embedded into other programs, as witnessed by doc/rxvt-tabbed

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or the upcoming "Gtk2::URxvt" perl module, which features a tabbed urxvt

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(murxvt) terminal as an example embedding application.

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How do I know which rxvt-unicode version I'm using?

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The version number is displayed with the usage (-h). Also the escape

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sequence "ESC [ 8 n" sets the window title to the version number. When

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using the urxvtc client, the version displayed is that of the daemon.

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Rxvt-unicode uses gobs of memory, how can I reduce that?

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Rxvt-unicode tries to obey the rule of not charging you for something

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you don't use. One thing you should try is to configure out all settings

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that you don't need, for example, Xft support is a resource hog by

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design, when used. Compiling it out ensures that no Xft font will be

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loaded accidentally when rxvt-unicode tries to find a font for your

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characters.

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Also, many people (me included) like large windows and even larger

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scrollback buffers: Without "--enable-unicode3", rxvt-unicode will use 6

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bytes per screen cell. For a 160x?? window this amounts to almost a

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kilobyte per line. A scrollback buffer of 10000 lines will then (if

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full) use 10 Megabytes of memory. With "--enable-unicode3" it gets

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worse, as rxvt-unicode then uses 8 bytes per screen cell.

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How can I start urxvtd in a race-free way?

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Try "urxvtd -f -o", which tells urxvtd to open the display, create the

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listening socket and then fork.

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How can I start urxvtd automatically when I run URXVT_NAME@@c?

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If you want to start urxvtd automatically whenever you run urxvtc and

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the daemon isn't running yet, use this script:

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#!/bin/sh

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urxvtc "$@"

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if [ $? -eq 2 ]; then

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urxvtd -q -o -f

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urxvtc "$@"

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fi

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This tries to create a new terminal, and if fails with exit status 2,

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meaning it couldn't connect to the daemon, it will start the daemon and

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re-run the command. Subsequent invocations of the script will re-use the

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existing daemon.

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How do I distinguish whether I'm running rxvt-unicode or a regular xterm? I need this to decide about setting colors etc.

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The original rxvt and rxvt-unicode always export the variable

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"COLORTERM", so you can check and see if that is set. Note that several

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programs, JED, slrn, Midnight Commander automatically check this

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variable to decide whether or not to use color.

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How do I set the correct, full IP address for the DISPLAY variable?

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If you've compiled rxvt-unicode with DISPLAY_IS_IP and have enabled

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insecure mode then it is possible to use the following shell script

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snippets to correctly set the display. If your version of rxvt-unicode

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wasn't also compiled with ESCZ_ANSWER (as assumed in these snippets)

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then the COLORTERM variable can be used to distinguish rxvt-unicode from

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a regular xterm.

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Courtesy of Chuck Blake <cblake@BBN.COM> with the following shell script

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snippets:

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# Bourne/Korn/POSIX family of shells:

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[ ${TERM:-foo} = foo ] && TERM=xterm # assume an xterm if we don't know

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if [ ${TERM:-foo} = xterm ]; then

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stty -icanon -echo min 0 time 15 # see if enhanced rxvt or not

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echo -n '^[Z'

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read term_id

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stty icanon echo

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if [ ""${term_id} = '^[[?1;2C' -a ${DISPLAY:-foo} = foo ]; then

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echo -n '^[[7n' # query the rxvt we are in for the DISPLAY string

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read DISPLAY # set it in our local shell

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fi

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fi

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How do I compile the manual pages on my own?

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You need to have a recent version of perl installed as /usr/bin/perl,

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one that comes with pod2man, pod2text and pod2html. Then go to the doc

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subdirectory and enter "make alldoc".

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Isn't rxvt-unicode supposed to be small? Don't all those features bloat?

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I often get asked about this, and I think, no, they didn't cause extra

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bloat. If you compare a minimal rxvt and a minimal urxvt, you can see

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that the urxvt binary is larger (due to some encoding tables always

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being compiled in), but it actually uses less memory (RSS) after

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startup. Even with "--disable-everything", this comparison is a bit

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unfair, as many features unique to urxvt (locale, encoding conversion,

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iso14755 etc.) are already in use in this mode.

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text data bss drs rss filename

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98398 1664 24 15695 1824 rxvt --disable-everything

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188985 9048 66616 18222 1788 urxvt --disable-everything

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When you "--enable-everything" (which *is* unfair, as this involves xft

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and full locale/XIM support which are quite bloaty inside libX11 and my

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libc), the two diverge, but not unreasonably so.

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text data bss drs rss filename

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163431 2152 24 20123 2060 rxvt --enable-everything

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1035683 49680 66648 29096 3680 urxvt --enable-everything

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The very large size of the text section is explained by the east-asian

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encoding tables, which, if unused, take up disk space but nothing else

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and can be compiled out unless you rely on X11 core fonts that use those

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encodings. The BSS size comes from the 64k emergency buffer that my c++

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compiler allocates (but of course doesn't use unless you are out of

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memory). Also, using an xft font instead of a core font immediately adds

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a few megabytes of RSS. Xft indeed is responsible for a lot of RSS even

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when not used.

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Of course, due to every character using two or four bytes instead of

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one, a large scrollback buffer will ultimately make rxvt-unicode use

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more memory.

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Compared to e.g. Eterm (5112k), aterm (3132k) and xterm (4680k), this

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still fares rather well. And compared to some monsters like

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gnome-terminal (21152k + extra 4204k in separate processes) or konsole

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(22200k + extra 43180k in daemons that stay around after exit, plus half

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a minute of startup time, including the hundreds of warnings it spits

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out), it fares extremely well *g*.

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Why C++, isn't that unportable/bloated/uncool?

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Is this a question? :) It comes up very often. The simple answer is: I

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had to write it, and C++ allowed me to write and maintain it in a

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fraction of the time and effort (which is a scarce resource for me). Put

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even shorter: It simply wouldn't exist without C++.

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My personal stance on this is that C++ is less portable than C, but in

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the case of rxvt-unicode this hardly matters, as its portability limits

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are defined by things like X11, pseudo terminals, locale support and

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unix domain sockets, which are all less portable than C++ itself.

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Regarding the bloat, see the above question: It's easy to write programs

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in C that use gobs of memory, an certainly possible to write programs in

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C++ that don't. C++ also often comes with large libraries, but this is

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not necessarily the case with GCC. Here is what rxvt links against on my

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system with a minimal config:

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libX11.so.6 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00002aaaaabc3000)

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libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00002aaaaadde000)

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libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00002aaaab01d000)

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/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)

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And here is rxvt-unicode:

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libX11.so.6 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00002aaaaabc3000)

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libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00002aaaaada2000)

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libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00002aaaaaeb0000)

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libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00002aaaab0ee000)

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/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)

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No large bloated libraries (of course, none were linked in statically),

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except maybe libX11 :)

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Rendering, Font & Look and Feel Issues

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I can't get transparency working, what am I doing wrong?

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First of all, transparency isn't officially supported in rxvt-unicode,

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so you are mostly on your own. Do not bug the author about it (but you

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may bug everybody else). Also, if you can't get it working consider it a

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rite of passage: ... and you failed.

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Here are four ways to get transparency. Do read the manpage and option

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descriptions for the programs mentioned and rxvt-unicode. Really, do it!

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1. Use inheritPixmap:

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Esetroot wallpaper.jpg

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urxvt -ip -tint red -sh 40

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That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack transparency and tinting

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support, or you are unable to read.

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2. Use a simple pixmap and emulate pseudo-transparency. This enables you

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to use effects other than tinting and shading: Just shade/tint/whatever

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your picture with gimp or any other tool:

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convert wallpaper.jpg -blur 20x20 -modulate 30 background.xpm

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urxvt -pixmap background.xpm -pe automove-background

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That works. If you think it doesn't, you lack XPM and Perl support, or

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you are unable to read.

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3. Use an ARGB visual:

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urxvt -depth 32 -fg grey90 -bg rgba:0000/0000/4444/cccc

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This requires XFT support, and the support of your X-server. If that

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doesn't work for you, blame Xorg and Keith Packard. ARGB visuals aren't

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there yet, no matter what they claim. Rxvt-Unicode contains the

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necessary bugfixes and workarounds for Xft and Xlib to make it work, but

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that doesn't mean that your WM has the required kludges in place.

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4. Use xcompmgr and let it do the job:

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xprop -frame -f _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 32c \

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-set _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY 0xc0000000

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Then click on a window you want to make transparent. Replace 0xc0000000

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by other values to change the degree of opacity. If it doesn't work and

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your server crashes, you got to keep the pieces.

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Why does rxvt-unicode sometimes leave pixel droppings?

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Most fonts were not designed for terminal use, which means that

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character size varies a lot. A font that is otherwise fine for terminal

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use might contain some characters that are simply too wide. Rxvt-unicode

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will avoid these characters. For characters that are just "a bit" too

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wide a special "careful" rendering mode is used that redraws adjacent

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characters.

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All of this requires that fonts do not lie about character sizes,

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however: Xft fonts often draw glyphs larger than their acclaimed

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bounding box, and rxvt-unicode has no way of detecting this (the correct

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way is to ask for the character bounding box, which unfortunately is

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wrong in these cases).

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It's not clear (to me at least), whether this is a bug in Xft, freetype,

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or the respective font. If you encounter this problem you might try

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using the "-lsp" option to give the font more height. If that doesn't

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work, you might be forced to use a different font.

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All of this is not a problem when using X11 core fonts, as their

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bounding box data is correct.

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How can I keep rxvt-unicode from using reverse video so much?

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First of all, make sure you are running with the right terminal settings

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("TERM=rxvt-unicode"), which will get rid of most of these effects. Then

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make sure you have specified colours for italic and bold, as otherwise

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rxvt-unicode might use reverse video to simulate the effect:

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URxvt.colorBD: white

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URxvt.colorIT: green

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Some programs assume totally weird colours (red instead of blue), how can I fix that?

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For some unexplainable reason, some rare programs assume a very weird

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colour palette when confronted with a terminal with more than the

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standard 8 colours (rxvt-unicode supports 88). The right fix is, of

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course, to fix these programs not to assume non-ISO colours without very

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good reasons.

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In the meantime, you can either edit your "rxvt-unicode" terminfo

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definition to only claim 8 colour support or use "TERM=rxvt", which will

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fix colours but keep you from using other rxvt-unicode features.

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Can I switch the fonts at runtime?

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Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which has the

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same effect as using the "-fn" switch, and takes effect immediately:

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printf '\33]50;%s\007' "9x15bold,xft:Kochi Gothic"

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This is useful if you e.g. work primarily with japanese (and prefer a

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japanese font), but you have to switch to chinese temporarily, where

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japanese fonts would only be in your way.

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You can think of this as a kind of manual ISO-2022 switching.

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Why do italic characters look as if clipped?

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Many fonts have difficulties with italic characters and hinting. For

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example, the otherwise very nicely hinted font "xft:Bitstream Vera Sans

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Mono" completely fails in its italic face. A workaround might be to

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enable freetype autohinting, i.e. like this:

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URxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true

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URxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true

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Can I speed up Xft rendering somehow?

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Yes, the most obvious way to speed it up is to avoid Xft entirely, as it

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is simply slow. If you still want Xft fonts you might try to disable

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antialiasing (by appending ":antialias=false"), which saves lots of

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memory and also speeds up rendering considerably.

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Rxvt-unicode doesn't seem to anti-alias its fonts, what is wrong?

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Rxvt-unicode will use whatever you specify as a font. If it needs to

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fall back to its default font search list it will prefer X11 core fonts,

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because they are small and fast, and then use Xft fonts. It has

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antialiasing disabled for most of them, because the author thinks they

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look best that way.

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If you want antialiasing, you have to specify the fonts manually.

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What's with this bold/blink stuff?

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If no bold colour is set via "colorBD:", bold will invert text using the

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standard foreground colour.

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For the standard background colour, blinking will actually make the text

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blink when compiled with "--enable-blinking". with standard colours.

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Without "--enable-blinking", the blink attribute will be ignored.

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On ANSI colours, bold/blink attributes are used to set high-intensity

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foreground/background colors.

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color0-7 are the low-intensity colors.

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color8-15 are the corresponding high-intensity colors.

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I don't like the screen colors. How do I change them?

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You can change the screen colors at run-time using ~/.Xdefaults

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resources (or as long-options).

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Here are values that are supposed to resemble a VGA screen, including

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the murky brown that passes for low-intensity yellow:

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URxvt.color0: #000000

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URxvt.color1: #A80000

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URxvt.color2: #00A800

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URxvt.color3: #A8A800

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URxvt.color4: #0000A8

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URxvt.color5: #A800A8

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URxvt.color6: #00A8A8

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URxvt.color7: #A8A8A8

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URxvt.color8: #000054

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URxvt.color9: #FF0054

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URxvt.color10: #00FF54

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URxvt.color11: #FFFF54

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URxvt.color12: #0000FF

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URxvt.color13: #FF00FF

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URxvt.color14: #00FFFF

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URxvt.color15: #FFFFFF

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And here is a more complete set of non-standard colors.

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URxvt.cursorColor: #dc74d1

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URxvt.pointerColor: #dc74d1

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URxvt.background: #0e0e0e

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URxvt.foreground: #4ad5e1

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URxvt.color0: #000000

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URxvt.color8: #8b8f93

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URxvt.color1: #dc74d1

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URxvt.color9: #dc74d1

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URxvt.color2: #0eb8c7

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URxvt.color10: #0eb8c7

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URxvt.color3: #dfe37e

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URxvt.color11: #dfe37e

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URxvt.color5: #9e88f0

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URxvt.color13: #9e88f0

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URxvt.color6: #73f7ff

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URxvt.color14: #73f7ff

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URxvt.color7: #e1dddd

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URxvt.color15: #e1dddd

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They have been described (not by me) as "pretty girly".

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Why do some characters look so much different than others?

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See next entry.

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How does rxvt-unicode choose fonts?

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Most fonts do not contain the full range of Unicode, which is fine.

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Chances are that the font you (or the admin/package maintainer of your

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system/os) have specified does not cover all the characters you want to

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display.

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rxvt-unicode makes a best-effort try at finding a replacement font.

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Often the result is fine, but sometimes the chosen font looks

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bad/ugly/wrong. Some fonts have totally strange characters that don't

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resemble the correct glyph at all, and rxvt-unicode lacks the artificial

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intelligence to detect that a specific glyph is wrong: it has to believe

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the font that the characters it claims to contain indeed look correct.

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In that case, select a font of your taste and add it to the font list,

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e.g.:

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urxvt -fn basefont,font2,font3...

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When rxvt-unicode sees a character, it will first look at the base font.

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If the base font does not contain the character, it will go to the next

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font, and so on. Specifying your own fonts will also speed up this

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search and use less resources within rxvt-unicode and the X-server.

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The only limitation is that none of the fonts may be larger than the

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base font, as the base font defines the terminal character cell size,

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which must be the same due to the way terminals work.

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Why do some chinese characters look so different than others?

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This is because there is a difference between script and language --

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rxvt-unicode does not know which language the text that is output is, as

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it only knows the unicode character codes. If rxvt-unicode first sees a

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japanese/chinese character, it might choose a japanese font for display.

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Subsequent japanese characters will use that font. Now, many chinese

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characters aren't represented in japanese fonts, so when the first

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non-japanese character comes up, rxvt-unicode will look for a chinese

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font -- unfortunately at this point, it will still use the japanese font

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for chinese characters that are also in the japanese font.

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The workaround is easy: just tag a chinese font at the end of your font

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list (see the previous question). The key is to view the font list as a

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preference list: If you expect more japanese, list a japanese font

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first. If you expect more chinese, put a chinese font first.

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In the future it might be possible to switch language preferences at

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runtime (the internal data structure has no problem with using different

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fonts for the same character at the same time, but no interface for this

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has been designed yet).

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Until then, you might get away with switching fonts at runtime (see "Can

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I switch the fonts at runtime?" later in this document).

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Keyboard, Mouse & User Interaction

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The new selection selects pieces that are too big, how can I select single words?

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If you want to select e.g. alphanumeric words, you can use the following

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setting:

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URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([[:word:]]+)

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If you click more than twice, the selection will be extended more and

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more.

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To get a selection that is very similar to the old code, try this

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pattern:

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URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ([^"&'()*,;<=>?@[\\\\]^`{|})]+)

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Please also note that the *LeftClick Shift-LeftClik* combination also

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selects words like the old code.

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I don't like the new selection/popups/hotkeys/perl, how do I change/disable it?

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You can disable the perl extension completely by setting the

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perl-ext-common resource to the empty string, which also keeps

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rxvt-unicode from initialising perl, saving memory.

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If you only want to disable specific features, you first have to

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identify which perl extension is responsible. For this, read the section

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PREPACKAGED EXTENSIONS in the urxvtperl(3) manpage. For example, to

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disable the selection-popup and option-popup, specify this

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perl-ext-common resource:

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URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-selection-popup,-option-popup

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This will keep the default extensions, but disable the two popup

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extensions. Some extensions can also be configured, for example,

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scrollback search mode is triggered by M-s. You can move it to any other

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combination either by setting the searchable-scrollback resource:

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URxvt.searchable-scrollback: CM-s

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The cursor moves when selecting text in the current input line, how do I switch this off?

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See next entry.

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During rlogin/ssh/telnet/etc. sessions, clicking near the cursor outputs strange escape sequences, how do I fix this?

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These are caused by the "readline" perl extension. Under normal

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circumstances, it will move your cursor around when you click into the

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line that contains it. It tries hard not to do this at the wrong moment,

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but when running a program that doesn't parse cursor movements or in

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some cases during rlogin sessions, it fails to detect this properly.

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You can permanently switch this feature off by disabling the "readline"

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extension:

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URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,-readline

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My numerical keypad acts weird and generates differing output?

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Some Debian GNUL/Linux users seem to have this problem, although no

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specific details were reported so far. It is possible that this is

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caused by the wrong "TERM" setting, although the details of whether and

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how this can happen are unknown, as "TERM=rxvt" should offer a

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compatible keymap. See the answer to the previous question, and please

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report if that helped.

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My Compose (Multi_key) key is no longer working.

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The most common causes for this are that either your locale is not set

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correctly, or you specified a preeditStyle that is not supported by your

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input method. For example, if you specified OverTheSpot and your input

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method (e.g. the default input method handling Compose keys) does not

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support this (for instance because it is not visual), then rxvt-unicode

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will continue without an input method.

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In this case either do not specify a preeditStyle or specify more than

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one pre-edit style, such as OverTheSpot,Root,None.

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I cannot type "Ctrl-Shift-2" to get an ASCII NUL character due to ISO 14755

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Either try "Ctrl-2" alone (it often is mapped to ASCII NUL even on

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international keyboards) or simply use ISO 14755 support to your

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advantage, typing <Ctrl-Shift-0> to get a ASCII NUL. This works for

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other codes, too, such as "Ctrl-Shift-1-d" to type the default telnet

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escape character and so on.

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Mouse cut/paste suddenly no longer works.

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Make sure that mouse reporting is actually turned off since killing some

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editors prematurely may leave the mouse in mouse report mode. I've heard

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that tcsh may use mouse reporting unless it otherwise specified. A quick

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check is to see if cut/paste works when the Alt or Shift keys are

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depressed.

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What's with the strange Backspace/Delete key behaviour?

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Assuming that the physical Backspace key corresponds to the Backspace

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keysym (not likely for Linux ... see the following question) there are

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two standard values that can be used for Backspace: "^H" and "^?".

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Historically, either value is correct, but rxvt-unicode adopts the

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debian policy of using "^?" when unsure, because it's the one only only

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correct choice :).

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Rxvt-unicode tries to inherit the current stty settings and uses the

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value of `erase' to guess the value for backspace. If rxvt-unicode

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wasn't started from a terminal (say, from a menu or by remote shell),

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then the system value of `erase', which corresponds to CERASE in

513

<termios.h>, will be used (which may not be the same as your stty

514

setting).

515

516

For starting a new rxvt-unicode:

517

518

# use Backspace = ^H

519

$ stty erase ^H

520

$ urxvt

521

522

# use Backspace = ^?

523

$ stty erase ^?

524

$ urxvt

525

526

Toggle with "ESC [ 36 h" / "ESC [ 36 l".

527

528

For an existing rxvt-unicode:

529

530

# use Backspace = ^H

531

$ stty erase ^H

532

$ echo -n "^[[36h"

533

534

# use Backspace = ^?

535

$ stty erase ^?

536

$ echo -n "^[[36l"

537

538

This helps satisfy some of the Backspace discrepancies that occur, but

539

if you use Backspace = "^H", make sure that the termcap/terminfo value

540

properly reflects that.

541

542

The Delete key is a another casualty of the ill-defined Backspace

543

problem. To avoid confusion between the Backspace and Delete keys, the

544

Delete key has been assigned an escape sequence to match the vt100 for

545

Execute ("ESC [ 3 ~") and is in the supplied termcap/terminfo.

546

547

Some other Backspace problems:

548

549

some editors use termcap/terminfo, some editors (vim I'm told) expect

550

Backspace = ^H, GNU Emacs (and Emacs-like editors) use ^H for help.

551

552

Perhaps someday this will all be resolved in a consistent manner.

553

554

I don't like the key-bindings. How do I change them?

555

There are some compile-time selections available via configure. Unless

556

you have run "configure" with the "--disable-resources" option you can

557

use the `keysym' resource to alter the keystrings associated with

558

keysyms.

559

560

Here's an example for a URxvt session started using "urxvt -name URxvt"

561

562

URxvt.keysym.Home: \033[1~

563

URxvt.keysym.End: \033[4~

564

URxvt.keysym.C-apostrophe: \033<C-'>

565

URxvt.keysym.C-slash: \033<C-/>

566

URxvt.keysym.C-semicolon: \033<C-;>

567

URxvt.keysym.C-grave: \033<C-`>

568

URxvt.keysym.C-comma: \033<C-,>

569

URxvt.keysym.C-period: \033<C-.>

570

URxvt.keysym.C-0x60: \033<C-`>

571

URxvt.keysym.C-Tab: \033<C-Tab>

572

URxvt.keysym.C-Return: \033<C-Return>

573

URxvt.keysym.S-Return: \033<S-Return>

574

URxvt.keysym.S-space: \033<S-Space>

575

URxvt.keysym.M-Up: \033<M-Up>

576

URxvt.keysym.M-Down: \033<M-Down>

577

URxvt.keysym.M-Left: \033<M-Left>

578

URxvt.keysym.M-Right: \033<M-Right>

579

URxvt.keysym.M-C-0: list \033<M-C- 0123456789 >

580

URxvt.keysym.M-C-a: list \033<M-C- abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz >

581

URxvt.keysym.F12: command:\033]701;zh_CN.GBK\007

582

583

See some more examples in the documentation for the keysym resource.

584

585

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

586

KP_Insert == Insert

587

F22 == Print

588

F27 == Home

589

F29 == Prior

590

F33 == End

591

F35 == Next

592

593

Rather than have rxvt-unicode try to accommodate all the various

594

possible keyboard mappings, it is better to use `xmodmap' to remap the

595

keys as required for your particular machine.

596

597

Terminal Configuration

598

Can I see a typical configuration?

599

The default configuration tries to be xterm-like, which I don't like

600

that much, but it's least surprise to regular users.

601

602

As a rxvt or rxvt-unicode user, you are practically supposed to invest

603

time into customising your terminal. To get you started, here is the

604

author's .Xdefaults entries, with comments on what they do. It's

605

certainly not *typical*, but what's typical...

606

607

URxvt.cutchars: "()*,<>[]{}|'

608

URxvt.print-pipe: cat >/tmp/xxx

609

610

These are just for testing stuff.

611

612

URxvt.imLocale: ja_JP.UTF-8

613

URxvt.preeditType: OnTheSpot,None

614

615

This tells rxvt-unicode to use a special locale when communicating with

616

the X Input Method, and also tells it to only use the OnTheSpot pre-edit

617

type, which requires the "xim-onthespot" perl extension but rewards me

618

with correct-looking fonts.

619

620

URxvt.perl-lib: /root/lib/urxvt

621

URxvt.perl-ext-common: default,selection-autotransform,selection-pastebin,xim-onthespot,remote-clipboard

622

URxvt.selection.pattern-0: ( at .*? line \\d+)

623

URxvt.selection.pattern-1: ^(/[^:]+):\

624

URxvt.selection-autotransform.0: s/^([^:[:space:]]+):(\\d+):?$/:e \\Q$1\\E\\x0d:$2\\x0d/

625

URxvt.selection-autotransform.1: s/^ at (.*?) line (\\d+)$/:e \\Q$1\\E\\x0d:$2\\x0d/

626

627

This is my perl configuration. The first two set the perl library

628

directory and also tells urxvt to use a large number of extensions. I

629

develop for myself mostly, so I actually use most of the extensions I

630

write.

631

632

The selection stuff mainly makes the selection perl-error-message aware

633

and tells it to convert perl error messages into vi-commands to load the

634

relevant file and go tot he error line number.

635

636

URxvt.scrollstyle: plain

637

URxvt.secondaryScroll: true

638

639

As the documentation says: plain is the preferred scrollbar for the

640

author. The "secondaryScroll" configures urxvt to scroll in full-screen

641

apps, like screen, so lines scrolled out of screen end up in urxvt's

642

scrollback buffer.

643

644

URxvt.background: #000000

645

URxvt.foreground: gray90

646

URxvt.color7: gray90

647

URxvt.colorBD: #ffffff

648

URxvt.cursorColor: #e0e080

649

URxvt.throughColor: #8080f0

650

URxvt.highlightColor: #f0f0f0

651

652

Some colours. Not sure which ones are being used or even non-defaults,

653

but these are in my .Xdefaults. Most notably, they set

654

foreground/background to light gray/black, and also make sure that the

655

colour 7 matches the default foreground colour.

656

657

URxvt.underlineColor: yellow

658

659

Another colour, makes underline lines look different. Sometimes hurts,

660

but is mostly a nice effect.

661

662

URxvt.geometry: 154x36

663

URxvt.loginShell: false

664

URxvt.meta: ignore

665

URxvt.utmpInhibit: true

666

667

Uh, well, should be mostly self-explanatory. By specifying some defaults

668

manually, I can quickly switch them for testing.

669

670

URxvt.saveLines: 8192

671

672

A large scrollback buffer is essential. Really.

673

674

URxvt.mapAlert: true

675

676

The only case I use it is for my IRC window, which I like to keep

677

iconified till people msg me (which beeps).

678

679

URxvt.visualBell: true

680

681

The audible bell is often annoying, especially when in a crowd.

682

683

URxvt.insecure: true

684

685

Please don't hack my mutt! Ooops...

686

687

URxvt.pastableTabs: false

688

689

I once thought this is a great idea.

690

691

urxvt.font: 9x15bold,\

692

-misc-fixed-bold-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1,\

693

-misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1, \

694

[codeset=JISX0208]xft:Kochi Gothic, \

695

xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:autohint=true, \

696

xft:Code2000:antialias=false

697

urxvt.boldFont: -xos4-terminus-bold-r-normal--14-140-72-72-c-80-iso8859-15

698

urxvt.italicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:italic:autohint=true

699

urxvt.boldItalicFont: xft:Bitstream Vera Sans Mono:bold:italic:autohint=true

700

701

I wrote rxvt-unicode to be able to specify fonts exactly. So don't be

702

overwhelmed. A special note: the "9x15bold" mentioned above is actually

703

the version from XFree-3.3, as XFree-4 replaced it by a totally

704

different font (different glyphs for ";" and many other harmless

705

characters), while the second font is actually the "9x15bold" from

706

XFree4/XOrg. The bold version has less chars than the medium version, so

707

I use it for rare characters, too. When editing sources with vim, I use

708

italic for comments and other stuff, which looks quite good with

709

Bitstream Vera anti-aliased.

710

711

Terminus is a quite bad font (many very wrong glyphs), but for most of

712

my purposes, it works, and gives a different look, as my normal

713

(Non-bold) font is already bold, and I want to see a difference between

714

bold and normal fonts.

715

716

Please note that I used the "urxvt" instance name and not the "URxvt"

717

class name. Thats because I use different configs for different

718

purposes, for example, my IRC window is started with "-name IRC", and

719

uses these defaults:

720

721

IRC*title: IRC

722

IRC*geometry: 87x12+535+542

723

IRC*saveLines: 0

724

IRC*mapAlert: true

725

IRC*font: suxuseuro

726

IRC*boldFont: suxuseuro

727

IRC*colorBD: white

728

IRC*keysym.M-C-1: command:\033]710;suxuseuro\007\033]711;suxuseuro\007

729

IRC*keysym.M-C-2: command:\033]710;9x15bold\007\033]711;9x15bold\007

730

731

"Alt-Shift-1" and "Alt-Shift-2" switch between two different font sizes.

732

"suxuseuro" allows me to keep an eye (and actually read) stuff while

733

keeping a very small window. If somebody pastes something complicated

734

(e.g. japanese), I temporarily switch to a larger font.

735

736

The above is all in my ".Xdefaults" (I don't use ".Xresources" nor

737

"xrdb"). I also have some resources in a separate ".Xdefaults-hostname"

738

file for different hosts, for example, on ym main desktop, I use:

739

740

URxvt.keysym.C-M-q: command:\033[3;5;5t

741

URxvt.keysym.C-M-y: command:\033[3;5;606t

742

URxvt.keysym.C-M-e: command:\033[3;1605;5t

743

URxvt.keysym.C-M-c: command:\033[3;1605;606t

744

URxvt.keysym.C-M-p: perl:test

745

746

The first for keysym definitions allow me to quickly bring some windows

747

in the layout I like most. Ion users might start laughing but will stop

748

immediately when I tell them that I use my own Fvwm2 module for much the

749

same effect as Ion provides, and I only very rarely use the above key

750

combinations :->

751

752

Why doesn't rxvt-unicode read my resources?

753

Well, why, indeed? It does, in a way very similar to other X

754

applications. Most importantly, this means that if you or your OS loads

755

resources into the X display (the right way to do it), rxvt-unicode will

756

ignore any resource files in your home directory. It will only read

757

$HOME/.Xdefaults when no resources are attached to the display.

758

759

If you have or use an $HOME/.Xresources file, chances are that resources

760

are loaded into your X-server. In this case, you have to re-login after

761

every change (or run xrdb -merge $HOME/.Xresources).

762

763

Also consider the form resources have to use:

764

765

URxvt.resource: value

766

767

If you want to use another form (there are lots of different ways of

768

specifying resources), make sure you understand whether and why it

769

works. If unsure, use the form above.

770

771

When I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?

772

The terminal description used by rxvt-unicode is not as widely available

773

as that for xterm, or even rxvt (for which the same problem often

774

arises).

775

776

The correct solution for this problem is to install the terminfo, this

777

can be done like this (with ncurses' infocmp):

778

779

REMOTE=remotesystem.domain

780

infocmp rxvt-unicode | ssh $REMOTE "cat >/tmp/ti && tic /tmp/ti"

781

782

... or by installing rxvt-unicode normally on the remote system,

783

784

If you cannot or do not want to do this, then you can simply set

785

"TERM=rxvt" or even "TERM=xterm", and live with the small number of

786

problems arising, which includes wrong keymapping, less and different

787

colours and some refresh errors in fullscreen applications. It's a nice

788

quick-and-dirty workaround for rare cases, though.

789

790

If you always want to do this (and are fine with the consequences) you

791

can either recompile rxvt-unicode with the desired TERM value or use a

792

resource to set it:

793

794

URxvt.termName: rxvt

795

796

If you don't plan to use rxvt (quite common...) you could also replace

797

the rxvt terminfo file with the rxvt-unicode one and use "TERM=rxvt".

798

799

"tic" outputs some error when compiling the terminfo entry.

800

Most likely it's the empty definition for "enacs=". Just replace it by

801

"enacs=\E[0@" and try again.

802

803

"bash"'s readline does not work correctly under urxvt.

804

See next entry.

805

806

I need a termcap file entry.

807

One reason you might want this is that some distributions or operating

808

systems still compile some programs using the long-obsoleted termcap

809

library (Fedora Core's bash is one example) and rely on a termcap entry

810

for "rxvt-unicode".

811

812

You could use rxvt's termcap entry with reasonable results in many

813

cases. You can also create a termcap entry by using terminfo's infocmp

814

program like this:

815

816

infocmp -C rxvt-unicode

817

818

Or you could use this termcap entry, generated by the command above:

819

820

rxvt-unicode|rxvt-unicode terminal (X Window System):\

821

:am:bw:eo:km:mi:ms:xn:xo:\

822

:co#80:it#8:li#24:lm#0:\

823

:AL=\E[%dL:DC=\E[%dP:DL=\E[%dM:DO=\E[%dB:IC=\E[%d@:\

824

:K1=\EOw:K2=\EOu:K3=\EOy:K4=\EOq:K5=\EOs:LE=\E[%dD:\

825

:RI=\E[%dC:SF=\E[%dS:SR=\E[%dT:UP=\E[%dA:ae=\E(B:al=\E[L:\

826

:as=\E(0:bl=^G:cd=\E[J:ce=\E[K:cl=\E[H\E[2J:\

827

:cm=\E[%i%d;%dH:cr=^M:cs=\E[%i%d;%dr:ct=\E[3g:dc=\E[P:\

828

:dl=\E[M:do=^J:ec=\E[%dX:ei=\E[4l:ho=\E[H:\

829

:i1=\E[?47l\E=\E[?1l:ic=\E[@:im=\E[4h:\

830

:is=\E[r\E[m\E[2J\E[H\E[?7h\E[?1;3;4;6l\E[4l:\

831

:k1=\E[11~:k2=\E[12~:k3=\E[13~:k4=\E[14~:k5=\E[15~:\

832

:k6=\E[17~:k7=\E[18~:k8=\E[19~:k9=\E[20~:kD=\E[3~:\

833

:kI=\E[2~:kN=\E[6~:kP=\E[5~:kb=\177:kd=\EOB:ke=\E[?1l\E>:\

834

:kh=\E[7~:kl=\EOD:kr=\EOC:ks=\E[?1h\E=:ku=\EOA:le=^H:\

835

:mb=\E[5m:md=\E[1m:me=\E[m\017:mr=\E[7m:nd=\E[C:rc=\E8:\

836

:sc=\E7:se=\E[27m:sf=^J:so=\E[7m:sr=\EM:st=\EH:ta=^I:\

837

:te=\E[r\E[?1049l:ti=\E[?1049h:ue=\E[24m:up=\E[A:\

838

:us=\E[4m:vb=\E[?5h\E[?5l:ve=\E[?25h:vi=\E[?25l:\

839

:vs=\E[?25h:

840

841

Why does "ls" no longer have coloured output?

842

The "ls" in the GNU coreutils unfortunately doesn't use terminfo to

843

decide whether a terminal has colour, but uses its own configuration

844

file. Needless to say, "rxvt-unicode" is not in its default file (among

845

with most other terminals supporting colour). Either add:

846

847

TERM rxvt-unicode

848

849

to "/etc/DIR_COLORS" or simply add:

850

851

alias ls='ls --color=auto'

852

853

to your ".profile" or ".bashrc".

854

855

Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. use the 88 colour mode?

856

See next entry.

857

858

Why doesn't vim/emacs etc. make use of italic?

859

See next entry.

860

861

Why are the secondary screen-related options not working properly?

862

Make sure you are using "TERM=rxvt-unicode". Some pre-packaged

863

distributions (most notably Debian GNU/Linux) break rxvt-unicode by

864

setting "TERM" to "rxvt", which doesn't have these extra features.

865

Unfortunately, some of these (most notably, again, Debian GNU/Linux)

866

furthermore fail to even install the "rxvt-unicode" terminfo file, so

867

you will need to install it on your own (See the question When I log-in

868

to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data? on how to do

869

this).

870

871

Encoding / Locale / Input Method Issues

872

Rxvt-unicode does not seem to understand the selected encoding?

873

See next entry.

874

875

Unicode does not seem to work?

876

If you encounter strange problems like typing an accented character but

877

getting two unrelated other characters or similar, or if program output

878

is subtly garbled, then you should check your locale settings.

879

880

Rxvt-unicode must be started with the same "LC_CTYPE" setting as the

881

programs. Often rxvt-unicode is started in the "C" locale, while the

882

login script running within the rxvt-unicode window changes the locale

883

to something else, e.g. "en_GB.UTF-8". Needless to say, this is not

884

going to work.

885

886

The best thing is to fix your startup environment, as you will likely

887

run into other problems. If nothing works you can try this in your

888

.profile.

889

890

printf '\33]701;%s\007' "$LC_CTYPE"

891

892

If this doesn't work, then maybe you use a "LC_CTYPE" specification not

893

supported on your systems. Some systems have a "locale" command which

894

displays this (also, "perl -e0" can be used to check locale settings, as

895

it will complain loudly if it cannot set the locale). If it displays

896

something like:

897

898

locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: ...

899

900

Then the locale you specified is not supported on your system.

901

902

If nothing works and you are sure that everything is set correctly then

903

you will need to remember a little known fact: Some programs just don't

904

support locales :(

905

906

How does rxvt-unicode determine the encoding to use?

907

See next entry.

908

909

Is there an option to switch encodings?

910

Unlike some other terminals, rxvt-unicode has no encoding switch, and no

911

specific "utf-8" mode, such as xterm. In fact, it doesn't even know

912

about UTF-8 or any other encodings with respect to terminal I/O.

913

914

The reasons is that there exists a perfectly fine mechanism for

915

selecting the encoding, doing I/O and (most important) communicating

916

this to all applications so everybody agrees on character properties

917

such as width and code number. This mechanism is the *locale*.

918

Applications not using that info will have problems (for example,

919

"xterm" gets the width of characters wrong as it uses its own,

920

locale-independent table under all locales).

921

922

Rxvt-unicode uses the "LC_CTYPE" locale category to select encoding. All

923

programs doing the same (that is, most) will automatically agree in the

924

interpretation of characters.

925

926

Unfortunately, there is no system-independent way to select locales, nor

927

is there a standard on how locale specifiers will look like.

928

929

On most systems, the content of the "LC_CTYPE" environment variable

930

contains an arbitrary string which corresponds to an already-installed

931

locale. Common names for locales are "en_US.UTF-8", "de_DE.ISO-8859-15",

932

"ja_JP.EUC-JP", i.e. "language_country.encoding", but other forms (i.e.

933

"de" or "german") are also common.

934

935

Rxvt-unicode ignores all other locale categories, and except for the

936

encoding, ignores country or language-specific settings, i.e.

937

"de_DE.UTF-8" and "ja_JP.UTF-8" are the normally same to rxvt-unicode.

938

939

If you want to use a specific encoding you have to make sure you start

940

rxvt-unicode with the correct "LC_CTYPE" category.

941

942

Can I switch locales at runtime?

943

Yes, using an escape sequence. Try something like this, which sets

944

rxvt-unicode's idea of "LC_CTYPE".

945

946

printf '\33]701;%s\007' ja_JP.SJIS

947

948