ref: d1540c7f666e3c5d636b48c956b444205b50502d
dir: /man/3/cons/
.TH CONS 3 .SH NAME cons \- console device .SH SYNOPSIS .nf .B bind #c /dev .B /dev/cons .B /dev/consctl .B /dev/drivers .B /dev/jit .B /dev/keyboard .B /dev/klog .B /dev/kprint .B /dev/memory .B /dev/msec .B /dev/null .B /dev/notquiterandom .B /dev/pointer .B /dev/random .B /dev/scancode .B /dev/sysctl .B /dev/sysname .B /dev/time .B /dev/user .fi .SH DESCRIPTION The console device serves a one-level directory giving access to the console and miscellaneous information. .PP Reading the .B cons file returns characters typed on the keyboard. Normally, characters are buffered to enable erase and kill processing. A control-U, .LR ^U , typed at the keyboard .I kills the current input line (removes all characters from the buffer of characters not yet read via .BR cons ), and a backspace .I erases the previous non-kill, non-erase character from the input buffer. Killing and erasing only delete characters back to, but not including, the last newline. Typed keystrokes produce 21-bit runes that are translated into the variable-length .SM UTF encoding (see .IR utf (6)) before putting them into the buffer. A .B read of length greater than zero causes the process to wait until a newline or a .L ^D ends the buffer, and then returns as much of the buffer as the argument to .B read allows, but only up to one complete line. A terminating .L ^D is not put into the buffer. If part of the line remains, the next .B read will return bytes from that remainder and not part of any new line that has been typed since. A single line containing a .L ^D can be used as an end of file indication to programs that take interactive input. .PP If the string .B rawon has been written to the .B consctl file and the file is still open, .B cons is in .IR "raw mode" : characters are not echoed as they are typed, backspace, .L ^U and .L ^D are not treated specially, and characters are available to .B read as soon as they are typed. Ordinary mode is reentered when .B rawoff is written to .B consctl or this file is closed. .PP A .B write to .B cons causes the characters to be printed on the console screen. .PP The .B keyboard file returns the underlying tokens produced by the keyboard hardware as they are produced; in the emulation environment, it is like an always-raw .B cons file. .PP The .B null file throws away anything written to it and always returns zero bytes when read. .PP The .B klog file returns the tail of messages written by the native kernel debugging function .B kprint (mainly used when debugging interrupt handlers in device drivers). It is available only in native kernel implementations. .PP The .B kprint file returns console output: messages written by kernel print statements and messages written by processes to this driver's .B cons file. Until .B kprint is opened, system console output is handled normally. Once .B kprint has been opened, if the machine's console is a serial line, the data is sent both to the serial console and to .BR kprint ; if the console is a graphics screen, the data is sent only to .BR kprint . .PP A read of the .B pointer file returns the status of the mouse or other pointing device: its position and button state. The read blocks until the state has changed since the last read. The read returns 49 bytes: the letter .B m followed by four fields containing decimal integers, each 11 characters wide followed by a blank. The integers are: x and y, coordinates of the pointer on the screen; a bit mask with the 1, 2, and 4 bits when the pointer's left, middle, and right buttons, respectively, are down; and a time stamp in units of milliseconds. .PP Writing to the .B pointer file, using the same format, causes the pointer to move to the specified x, y position (the button and millisecond fields are ignored, and optional). If there is a visible image representing the pointer's position, that will move too. .PP The .B random device returns as many bytes of random data as are requested in the .BR read . .PP The .B notquiterandom device returns as many bytes of pseudo-random data as are requested in the .BR read ; this is typically faster than .B random but the results are more predictable. .PP The .B scancode device provides access to the raw scan codes of the primary .B keyboard . While it is open, key strokes are diverted from .B cons and .B keyboard . The first .IR read (2) after opening returns an identifier string which defines the format of data delivered by subsequent reads. Known ones are defined in .IR scancode (6). The most common format is a single byte per scan code, where the top bit is 1 for up and 0 for down, and the bottom 7 bits are the scan code. Some input devices have a larger scan code space; in this case scan codes are often delivered as two byte little endian quantities, where the top bit is the up/down signifier, and the bottom 15 bits are the scan code. In all cases the meaning of the individual scan codes is device specific. .PP The rest of the files contain (mostly) read-only strings. Each string has a fixed length: a .I read (see .IR sys-read (2)) of more than that gives a result of that fixed length (the result does not include a terminating zero byte); a .I read of less than that length leaves the file offset so the rest of the string (but no more) will be read the next time. To reread the file without closing it, .I seek must be used to reset the offset. When the file contains numeric data, each number is formatted in decimal as an 11-digit number with leading blanks and one trailing blank: twelve bytes total. .PP The .B sysctl file can be read to return the current Inferno version. Writing the string .B reboot to it attempts to reboot the system, writing .B halt attempts to halt the system. Writing .B nobroken ensures that broken processes have all associated memory freed before being destroyed, writing .B broken ensures that they are left in this state to allow debugging (the default). Only the privileged user is allowed to write to this file. .PP The .B sysname file holds the textual name of the machine. It can only be written by the privileged user. .PP The .B user file contains the name of the user associated with the current process. It can only be written by the privileged user. In the emulation environment, writing to this file also attempts to set the user id in the host operating system to the specified value. .PP The .B memory file returns a formatted presentation of the state of the memory allocation pools in the system. Each line of output returned reports, for a single pool, the amount of memory in use, the upper size limit, the high water mark, the number of allocations done, the number of frees done, the number of extensions done, the largest chunk available and the name of the pool. .PP The .B drivers file returns a list of the device drivers loaded in the system. Each line gives the name of the device for .IR bind (1), such as .BR #c , followed by the name of the driver as used in the system configuration file. .PP The other files served by the .I cons device are all single numbers: .TP .B jit non-zero if `just in time' compilation is configured (can be written to change the state). Writing 0 turns off JIT compilation, 1 turns it on and larger values give increasingly detailed traces of the compilation for debugging purposes. .TP .B msec the value of a millisecond counter .TP .B time number of microseconds since the epoch 00:00:00 GMT, Jan. 1, 1970. (Can be written once by the privileged user, to set at boot time.) .SH SOURCE .B /emu/port/devcons.c .br .B /os/port/devcons.c .SH SEE ALSO .IR draw (3), .IR keyboard (6), .IR utf (6), .IR eve (10.2) .SH BUGS For debugging, on native systems only, two control-T's followed by a letter generate console output: .L ^T^Tp prints data about kernel processes, .L ^T^Ts prints the kernel stack, .L ^T^Tx prints data about memory allocation. .PP The system can be rebooted by typing .LR ^T^Tr .