FGETTY(8)

📦 version 0.7, in debian bookworm, debian trixie, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble, ubuntu questing, ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💖 NAME 💖

ok so fgetty — it's a tiny little getty for linux ✨ like the smallest, cutest bouncer at the door of your terminal. that's the whole vibe. you're welcome.

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

fgetty tty [--noclear] [--long-hostname]

bestie you literally just hand it a tty and maybe sprinkle some flags on top. that's it. that's the whole summoning ritual 🫶

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

okay so picture this: fgetty is normally called by init(8) (yes, that init, the main character of boot). it opens a tty port, hits you with a login name prompt, and then hands the whole situation over to the /bin/login command. no drama, no extra steps, just vibes and authentication 💅

it's giving "small but does its job perfectly". lowkey iconic.

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

  • --noclear — makes fgetty not clear the screen before it shows the login prompt. so all your previous terminal chaos stays on display. no wipe, just vibes 🙈
  • --long-hostname — makes fgetty display the full hostname in the login prompt. like the whole entire thing, not the short one. flex it 🌈

🦋 FILES 🦋

  • /etc/issue — printed before the login prompt. it's the little welcome banner energy ✨
  • /etc/inittab — the init(8) configuration file
  • /var/run/utmp — the system status file. it keeps the receipts of who's logged in 💀

🌟 ISSUE ESCAPES 🌟

so the issue-file — that's /etc/issue, or the file may contain certain escape codes — can show the system name, date and time etc. and the way that works is every escape code is a backslash (\) immediately followed by one of the letters below. literally just \ + one letter. iykyk 🧚

  • d — the current date. (eg: 2002-01-19)
  • s — the system name, the name of the operating system. (eg: Linux)
  • l — the name of the current tty line. (eg: tty3)
  • m — the architecture identifier of the machine (eg: i586)
  • n — the nodename of the machine, also known as the hostname. (eg: sirius)
  • o — the domainname of the machine. (eg: (none))
  • r — the release number of the OS. (eg: 2.4.3-i)
  • t — the current time. (eg: 14:51:51)
  • u — the number of current users logged in. (eg: 4)
  • U — the string "1 user" or "<n> users", where <n> is the number of current users logged in. (eg: 4 users)
  • v — Insert the version of the OS. (eg: #2 Fre Jan 18 23:05:45 CET 2002)
⚠️ note that u and U are different letters bestie. one is a number, one is a whole little sentence. don't mix them up 💀

💜 ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES 💜

  • HOST — is set to your hostname
  • TERM — is set to linux
  • TTY — is set to the current tty line

👑 RETURN VALUES 👑

okay so when things go sideways, fgetty tells you exactly which way, with numbers. here's the whole chart, no skips, no cuts 💅

  • 1 — could not chown/chmod tty device
  • 3 — could not open tty device
  • 4 — not a typewriter
  • 5 — vhangup failed
  • 6 — could not open tty (can't happen)
  • 7 — dup failed
  • 8 — could not exec login
  • 9 — read returned an unexpected error
  • 10 — unprintable character in login name
  • 11 — login name too long (>40)
  • 13 — user name started with a dash
  • 23 — received SIGQUIT
😭 the way 6 literally says "can't happen"… anyway it's still on the list so here it is. periodt.

💖 AUTHOR 💖

Felix von Leitner <felix-fgetty@fefe.de>

Homepage: http://www.fefe.de/fgetty/

okay bestie that's the whole page 🫶 this was fgetty from the System Administrator's Manual, version/date 2002-01-19. go forth and log in, main character 💅✨🎀

📦 where this page comes from