MAPSCRN(8)

✨ mapscrn(8) — the System Manager's Manual page, but make it a group chat ✨

okay bestie, gather round, because we're talking about mapscrn — a little command from the kbd world, living in section 8 of the manual (that's the system manager's manual, for the girlies keeping notes 💅).

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💖 NAME 💖

mapscrn — load screen output mapping table. that's it. that's the whole job. loading a mapping table for your screen output. iconic behavior honestly 🎀

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

mapscrn [options] mapfile

you give it some options, you give it a mapfile, it does the thing. simple as. ✨

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

okay so first things first, and I need you to sit down for this one: mapscrn is obsolete. 😭 fr fr. its whole function got built-in into setfont. BUT — and this is the important part — for backwards compatibility it's still hanging around as its own separate command. so it's giving retired-but-still-shows-up-to-the-party energy. we love her for that 💜

so what does she actually do? the mapscrn command loads a user defined output character mapping table into the console driver. 🫶

and then — plot twist — the console driver can later be put into use user-defined mapping table mode by outputting a special escape sequence to the console device. that sequence is:

• <esc>(K for the G0 character set
• <esc>)K for the G1 character set

and when you pass the -o option, the old map gets saved in map.orig. keeping receipts, as she should. 💅

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🧚 USE 🧚

so there are two kinds of mapping tables and you need to know which one you're dealing with:

1. direct-to-font tables — these give a font position for each user byte value.
2. user-to-unicode tables — these give a unicode value for each user byte.

and the corresponding glyph is now found using the unicode index of the font. iykyk 🌈

now, examples because that's how we learn:

mapscrn trivial

this one sets up a one-to-one direct-to-font table where user bytes directly address the font. super useful for fonts that are in the same order as the character set one uses. lowkey perfect for that scenario ✨

and a command like:

mapscrn 8859-2

sets up a user-to-unicode table that assumes the user uses ISO 8859-2. periodt. 💖

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💀 INPUT FORMAT 💀

mapscrn can read the map in either of two formats:

1. 256 or 512 bytes binary data
2. two-column text file

Format (1) is a direct image of the translation table. and here's the breakdown:

• the 256-bytes tables are direct-to-font
• the 512-bytes tables are user-to-unicode

Format (2) is used to fill the table as follows: the cell with the offset mentioned in the first column is filled with the value mentioned in the second column. and then — vibe check — when values larger than 255 occur, or values are written using the U+xxxx notation, the table is assumed to be a user-to-unicode table. otherwise? it's a direct-to-font table. no cap 🧚

values in the file may be specified in one of several formats, and bestie there are six:

1. Decimal: string of decimal digits not starting with '0'
2. Octal: string of octal digits beginning with '0'
3. Hexadecimal: string of hexadecimal digits preceded by "0x"
4. Unicode: string of four hexadecimal digits preceded by "U+"
5. Character: single character enclosed in single quotes. (and the binary value is used.) — note that blank, comma, tab character and '#' cannot be specified with this format. 🙈
6. UTF-8 Character: single (possibly multi-byte) UTF-8 character, enclosed in single quotes.

⚠️ okay important one: control characters (with codes < 32) cannot be re-mapped with mapscrn because they have special meaning for the driver. that's not a suggestion, that's just how it is. 💀

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👑 OPTIONS 👑

• -o, --output=FILE — save the old map to the FILE. keeping the old one safe, we love a backup moment 💾
• -C, --console=DEV — the console device to be used.
• -v, --verbose — be more verbose. she's a talker, let her talk 🗣️
• -V, --version — print version number.
• -h, --help — print this usage message.

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🎀 FILES 🎀

• /usr/share/kbd/consoletrans — the default directory for screen mappings. that's home base bestie 🏠

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🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• setfont(8) — the main character who absorbed mapscrn's whole job. go say hi 💜

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⭐ AUTHOR ⭐

Copyright (C) 1993 Eugene G. Crosser <crosser@pccross.msk.su>

This software and documentation may be distributed freely. 🫶 (generous queen behavior, honestly)

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and that's the whole page bestie!! ✨ this was the kbd manual page, dated 24 October 2024, and you can find it filed under MAPSCRN(8). go forth and map those screens, you've got this 💅💖🦋🌸🎀