Copyright © 2000, 2001, 2002 Jonathan Singer
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".
This document is the user handbook for the Konsole application.
Konsole is an X terminal emulator for KDE.
Table of Contents
Introduction to Konsole
UNIX® operating systems were originally designed as text-only systems, controlled by keyboard commands -- what is known as a command-line interface (CLI). The X Window System® and KDE and other projects have since added the graphical interface you are now using. However, the underlying CLI system is still there, and is frequently the easiest, fastest and most powerful way to perform many tasks.
Konsole is what is known as an X terminal emulator, often referred to as a terminal or a shell. It gives you the equivalent of an old-fashioned text screen on your desktop, but one which can easily share the screen with your graphical applications. Windows users may be familiar with the MS-DOS Prompt utility, which has the analogous function of offering a DOS™ command-line under Windows®. (Although the UNIX® CLIs offer far more power and ease of use than does DOS!)
Explaining the use of the UNIX® CLI is beyond the scope of this document, as it would require a lengthy book. Fortunately, many such books are available in every language in any good bookstore or library. There are also tutorials available on the Internet. Enjoy KDE, but don't be shy about learning to use the command-line! You will find that even learning just the basics will make your computer use much more efficient and enjoyable.
What makes Konsole special?
Konsole's advanced features include simple configuration and the ability to use multiple terminal shells in a single window, making for a less cluttered desktop.
Using Konsole, a user can open:
Linux® console sessions
Shell sessions
Screen sessions
Midnight Commander file manager sessions
Root console sessions
Root Midnight Commander sessions
These sessions can be renamed to help you keep track of all your shells, or signaled (STOP, CONT, HUP, INT, TERM, KILL).
For more control over Konsole, a user can:
hide/show the menubar, toolbar, scrollbar and/or frame
select the size of a Konsole window, fonts, color schemes, and key mapping
change location of the scrollbar or hide the scrollbar
All chosen settings can be made the default for forthcoming sessions by saving them.
For those with a deep interest in the taxonomy of free X terminals, there are two others of this kind: xterm, the original, written even before X itself (a month or two), and xvt, a lightweight xterm clone, on which most other currently available derivatives (notably eterm) are based.
After a decade, Konsole is the first rewrite from the ground up. While xterm has definitely been hacked to death (its README starts with the words “Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here”), Konsole offers a fresh start using contemporary technologies and understanding of X.
Use of Konsole
When Konsole is started, an application (typically a UNIX® shell) runs in the window. Simply type at the prompt.
A "Tip of the Day" window may also appear on startup, offering hints on the use of Konsole. If you do not wish to receive tips, uncheck the Show on start box.
History
As lines scroll off the top of the screen, they can be reviewed by moving the scroll bar upwards, or through the use of the Shift+Page Up (to move back a page), Shift+Page Down (to move forward a page), Shift+Up (to move up a line) and Shift+Down (to move down a line) keys (provided the "History" option is on).
Mouse Buttons
- Left
Clicking the left button is passed as an event to the application running in the emulation, if it is mouse-aware. If a program will react on mouse clicks, Konsole indicates this by showing an arrow cursor. If not, an I-beam (bar) cursor is shown.
Holding the left button down and dragging the mouse over the screen with a mouse-unaware application running will mark a region of the text. While dragging, the marked text is displayed reversed for visual feedback. When the button is released, the marked text is copied to the clipboard for further use within Konsole or another application. The selected text can also be dragged and dropped into compatible applications. Click on the selected text and drag it to the desired location.
Normally, new-line characters are inserted at the end of each line selected. This is best for cut and paste of source code, or the output of a particular command. For ordinary text, the line breaks are often not important. One might prefer, however, for the text to be a stream of characters that will be automatically re-formatted when pasted into another application. To select in text-stream mode, hold down the Ctrl key while selecting normally.
If the upper or lower edge of the text area is touched while marking, Konsole scrolls up or down, eventually exposing text within the history buffer. The scrolling stops when the mouse stops moving.
After the mouse is released, Konsole attempts to keep the text in the clipboard visible by holding the marked area reversed. The marked area reverts back to normal as soon as the contents of the clipboard change, the text within the marked area is altered or the left mouse button is clicked.
To mark text on a mouse-aware application the Shift key has to be pressed when clicking.
- Middle
Pressing the middle button pastes text currently in the clipboard. Holding down the Ctrl key as you press the middle button pastes the text and sends it to Konsole.
Note
If you have a mouse with only two buttons, pressing both the left and right buttons together emulates the middle button of a three button mouse.
- Right
The right button brings up a menu with the Show Menubar, Paste, Send Signal, Rename Session, Settings and Close Session menu items. The Ctrl+right button brings up the Session menu.
Menu Bar
The menubar is at the top of the Konsole window. It can be hidden and restored by toggling Show Menubar in the Settings menu. When the menubar is hidden, Show Menubar can be reached by right clicking in the window or by Alt+Ctrl+M.
- Session->New Shell
Opens a new session with a terminal shell. Alt+Ctrl+N can also be used, aas described in more detail below.
- Session->New Screen Session
Opens a new session with the Screen virtual terminal manager. See man screen for more information.
- Session->New Root Console
Opens a new session with a terminal shell, as the root user.
After being prompted for the root password, the # prompt appears, indicating that the user is working with root privileges. This is frequently necessary for installing new software and other system maintenance, but care should be taken to avoid accidental damage.
- Session->New Midnight Commander
Opens a new session with the Midnight Commander graphical file browser.
- Session->New Linux Console
Opens a new session emulating a text-only Linux® system.
Note
See the file README.linux.console in the Konsole source package for detailed information on how the Linux® console differs from a typical UNIX® console. If this doesn't mean anything to you, you almost certainly don't need to worry about it.
- Session->New Root Midnight Commander
Opens a new session with the Midnight Commander graphical file browser, as the root user.
After being prompted for the root password, the # prompt appears under the browser window, indicating that the user is working with root privileges. Again, working as root is frequently necessary but care should be taken to avoid accidental damage.
- Session->Close Session
Closes the current session.
- Session->Quit
Quits Konsole, closing all sessions and any applications launched from them.
You can also open a new session with a key shortcut. By default, Alt+Ctrl+N is used. You can also define your own key shortcut to launch a new terminal session. The files with a *.keytab extension in $KDEDIR/share/apps/konsole define keyboard shortcuts.
For instance, adding the definition: key F12 + Shift : newSession to the active keytab files causes a new shell to be launched upon hitting Shift+F12. Use the Settings->Keyboard menu command to choose a keytab file. The file README.KeyTab contains more information on defining shortcuts.
Finally, note that the session types can be modified, and new types created, by using the KDE Control Center module System->Konsole.
- Edit->Paste
Pastes text from the clipboard at the cursor location.
- Edit->Send Signal
Send Signal - Sends the specified signal to the shell process, or other process, that was launched when the new session was started.
Currently available signals are:
STOP to stop process CONT continue if stopped HUP hangup detected on controlling terminal, or death of controlling process INT interrupt from keyboard TERM termination signal KILL kill signal Refer to your system manual pages for further details by giving the command man 7 signal.
- Edit->Find in History
Finds a word or string of text in the current history. Options allow case sensitive or backwards searches.
- Edit->Save History As
Saves the current history as a text file.
- Edit->Clear History
Clears the history for the current session.
- Edit->Clear All Histories
Clears the history for all sessions.
- View->Rename Session
Opens a dialog box allowing you to change the name of the current session. The name is displayed on the session tab. Alt+Ctrl+S can also be used.
- View->Monitor for Activity
Flags the current session so it will show an alert if activity occurs. An icon of a lit light bulb will appear in the session's tab. Use this to alert you if something happens while you are working in another session.
- View->Monitor for Silence
Flags the current session so it will show an alert if no activity occurs for 10 seconds. An icon of a dark light bulb will appear in the session's tab. Use this to alert you if a task stops while you are working in another session.
- View->Send Input to All Sessions
Flags the current session so any commands entered into it will be sent to all sessions. The session will have a small icon in its tab to remind you to be careful of what you enter! rm -rf *, for instance, is probably not a good idea.
- View->Move Session Left
Moves the tab of the current session one tab to the left.
- View->Move Session Right
Moves the tab of the current session one tab to the right.
Shift+Left and Shift+Right can be also be used to move between sessions.
- View->Session icons...
At the bottom of the menu is a list of the available sessions. Selecting one makes that session active.
You can also use the Shift+Left/Shift+Right keys to cycle through the available sessions.
- Settings->Show Menubar
Shows or hides the menubar.
- Settings->Show Toolbar
Shows or hides the toolbar.
- Settings->Scrollbar
Controls location of scrollbar: none, left, or right.
- Settings->Fullscreen
Toggles window between full-screen and normal size.
- Settings->Bell
Sets the system bell to a KDE System Notification or a visible flash, or turns it off.
- Settings->Font
Sets font and font size
Select the Custom option to use any combination of font, size and style. The README.fonts file in the Konsole source package gives tips on which fonts will work well.
- Settings->Keyboard
Chooses desired keymapping.
The list of these keymappings is taken from $KDEDIR/share/apps/konsole/*.keytab. The file $KDEDIR/share/apps/konsole/README.KeyTab describes the keytab format in more detail. Add to or modify these files to match your needs.
- Settings->Schema
Sets colors of text and background.
The list of these schemata is taken from $KDEDIR/share/apps/konsole/*.schema. The file $KDEDIR/share/apps/konsole/README.Schema describes the schema format in more detail. Add to or modify these files to match your needs. You can also create custom schema from the KDE Control Center module System->Konsole.
- Settings->Size
Sets size of text area (given in columns x rows).
- Settings->History...
Opens a dialog where you can configure the history. The Enable checkbox toggles saving of lines that have scrolled off the top of the window. You can enter the Number of lines to remember in the text field, or use the spinner buttons to increase or decrease the number in steps of 100 lines. The Defaults button will reset the history to 1000 lines. Setting this value to 0 will cause all history to be saved. Press OK to save your changes, or Cancel to close the dialog without saving your settings. The Help button will open this manual, and display the text you're reading right now.
- Settings->Save Settings
Saves the current settings as the new defaults.
- Settings->Configure Konsole
Opens the KDE Control Center module, allowing many additional changes to the Konsole interface.
- Help->Konsole Handbook (F1)
Opens the table of contents of this document.
- Help->Tip of the Day...
Displays a helpful tip about the use of Konsole. Check the Show on start box to display a tip each time Konsole is started.
- Help->Report Bug...
Submit a bug report or a feature request for Konsole.
- Help->About Konsole...
Information about Konsole's author
- Help->About KDE...
Information about the KDE project
Toolbar
The toolbar is at the bottom of the Konsole window.
It can be hidden and restored by toggling Show Toolbar in the Settings menu or by clicking the textured “handle” at the side of the bar. The bar contains a New icon and icons for the current sessions. Clicking New opens a new “Shell” session.
Double-clicking a session tab opens a dialog box enabling you to change the name of that session. Alt+Ctrl+S can also be used to rename the active session.
Clicking an existing session's icon makes that session active.
When the toolbar is hidden, Shift+Left and Shift+Right can be used to move between sessions.
Command-line Options
When Konsole is started from the command-line, various options can be specified to modify its behavior.
- --help
List the various options
- --name name
Set the name that appears in the titlebar
- --ls
Start with a login shell environment. What that does varies depending on your system, but generally it means that files such as ~/.profile or ~/.bash_profile will be read. (If that doesn't mean anything to you, don't worry about it, but keep in the back of your mind for when you realize you need it.)
- -T title
Set the window title
- --tn terminal
Sets the environment variable TERM to the specified value. Read man xterm for more information on TERM.
- --xwin
Ignored
- --nohist
Disable the saving of lines that scroll off the top of the window
- --nomenubar
Start Konsole without a menubar
- --notoolbar
Start Konsole without a toolbar
- --noframe
Start Konsole without a frame
- --noscrollbar
Start Konsole without a scrollbar
- --noxft
Start Konsole without Xft antialiasing. Antialiasing of a small font may be difficult to read.
- --vt_sz CCxLL
Start a terminal window of CC Columns and LL lines
- --type type
Start a session of the given type rather than the default.
- --workdir dir
Open with dir as the working directory.
- -e command
Execute command instead of shell.
For instance:
bash$ konsole --vt_sz 90x25 --nohist
starts a Konsole window with 90 columns and 25 rows, with no history
Konsole also accepts generic Qt™ and KDE options:
- --help-qt
List Qt-specific options
- --help-kde
List KDE-specific options
- --help-all
List all options
- --author
Show the authors' names
- -v,--version
Show the version number
- --license
Show license information
Credits and Copyright
Konsole is maintained by Stephan Binner <Stephan.Binner@gmx.de>
The application Konsole copyright 1997-2000 Lars Doelle© <lars.doelle@on-line.de>
This document was written by Jonathan Singer <jsinger@leeta.net>
Converted to DocBook SGML by Michael McBride <mmcbride@ematic.com> and Lauri Watts <lauri@kde.org>
This documentation is licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.
This program is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
Konsole on non-Linux platforms
Information on building Konsole on platforms other than Linux® is available in the README.ports file in the Konsole source package. It provides a list of experts for certain platforms (Tru64, Solaris™, OpenBSD) and requests volunteers from other UNIX® platforms.