xenial (1) xvt.1.gz

Provided by: xvt_2.1-20.1ubuntu1_amd64 bug

NAME

       xvt - VT100 emulator for the X window system

SYNOPSIS

       xvt [ options ]

DESCRIPTION

       Xvt  is  a  VT100 terminal emulator for X.  It is intended as a replacement for xterm(1) for users who do
       not require the more esoteric features of xterm.  Specifically xvt does not implement the Tektronix  4014
       emulation, session logging and toolkit style configurability.  As a result, xvt uses much less swap space
       than xterm - a significant advantage on a machine serving many X sessions.

OPTIONS

       The options supported by xvt (which, with the exception of -msg, are  a  subset  of  those  supported  by
       xterm) are listed below.  Most command line arguments have X resource equivalents and these are listed in
       the following table.

       -e command [ arguments ]
              Run the command with its command line arguments in the xvt window.  If this  option  is  used,  it
              must  be  the  last  on the command line.  If there is no -e option then the default is to run the
              program specified by the SHELL environment variable or, failing that,  sh(1).   This  option  also
              causes  the  window title and icon name to be set to the name of the program being executed if the
              are not overwritten by a more specific option.

       -display display-name
              Attempt to open the xvt window on the named X display.  In the absence if this option, the display
              specified by the DISPLAY environment variable is used.

       -geometry window-geometry
              Create the window with the specified X window geometry.

       -background color
              Use the specified color as the window's background color.

       -bg color
              Same as -background.

       -foreground color
              Use the specified colour as the window's foreground color.

       -fg color
              Same as -foreground.

       -cr color
              Set the color used for the text cursor.

       -bw number
              Set the window border width to number pixels.  Many window managers ignore existing window borders
              and construct their own and so, if you are using such  a  window  manager,  this  option  will  be
              ignored.

       -bd color
              Set  the border color.  As with border width, this option will usually be disregarded with respect
              to the window's outer border.  It does, however, set the color of the line separating  the  scroll
              bar from the main part of the window.

       -font fontname
              Set the main text font used by xvt.

       -fn fontname
              Same as -font.

       -fb fontname
              Set  the  font  used  for the vt100 bold rendition style.  If this option is not set then xvt will
              render in bold by overprinting the normal font.

       -name name
              Set the name that is used when looking up X resource values for this instance of xvt.  This option
              also sets the icon name and window title unless they are set explicitly.

       -title text
              Set the string that is displayed in the window's title bar if it has one.

       -T text
              Same as -title

       -n text
              Set  the name that will be used to label the window's icon or displayed in an icon manager window.
              This option also sets the window's title unless it is set explicitly.

       -sl number
              Set an upper bound for the number of lines that will be saved when they have scrolled off the  top
              of the window.

       -sb    Start  up with the scrollbar visible.  The scrollbar can be displayed or hidden at any time simply
              by holding down the CONTROL key on the keyboard and pressing any mouse button.  The visibility  of
              the  scrollbar  does  not  determine  whether  scrolled text is saved or not - as with xterm, text
              scrolled off the top of the window is always saved up to the current maximum number of lines.

       -rw    Enable reverse wrapping of the cursor so that, for example, lines typed to a shell that are longer
              than the width of the screen can be edited.  This is the same as the xterm reverse wrap option.

       -cc string
              Input  or  modify  the  character  classes that are used to determine what is a word when a double
              click is used to select a word of displayed text.  This is identical to the same option in xterm -
              see the xterm manual page for a description of the syntax of string.

       -iconic
              Start up with the window already iconized.

       -msg   Enable  messages to the terminal window from programs like write(1).  By default, xvt windows have
              messages disabled.  Executing an xvt with the -msg option  has  the  same  effect  as  running  it
              normally and then executing the command mesg y to enable messages.

       -8     Treat characters as having eight bits - this is the default.  When in eight bit mode, xvt displays
              eight bit characters and pressing a keyboard key  with  the  Meta  key  held  down  generates  the
              character code with the MSB set.

       -7     Treat  characters  as  having  seven bits.  In this mode, each character is stripped to seven bits
              before it is displayed and pressing a keybaord key with the Meta key held down causes  the  normal
              character to be preceded by the Escape character.

       -ls    Run  a  login  shell.  This option causes xvt to execute its shell with a name beginning with `-'.
              In the case of csh(1) this results in the .login and .logout files being interpreted at the  start
              and end of the session.

       -sf    Enable Sun function key escape codes.  The default is standard xterm compatible function codes.

       -rv    Run in reverse video - that is, exchange the foreground and background colors.  This option has no
              effect if either the foreground or background color is set explicitly.

       -C     Connect this terminal to the system console.  This option is only implemented for SunOS 4 and  for
              a user who has read and write access to /dev/console.

       -console
              Same as -C.

X RESOURCES

       Almost  all  the  command line options have X resource counterparts and these are listed in the following
       table.  Like xterm, xvt uses the class name XTerm and so resource options set for  XTerm  will  work  for
       both xterm and xvt windows.

                                         Command line options and X resources
                               ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
                                                                 X resource
                                   Command line          Instance            Class
                               ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
                               -background or -bg     background        Background
                               -bd                    borderColor       BorderColor
                               -bw                    borderWidth       BorderWidth
                               -C or -console         -                 -
                               -cc                    charClass         CharClass
                               -cr                    cursorColor       CursorColor
                               -display               -                 -
                               -e                     -                 -
                               -fb                    boldFont          BoldFont
                               -font or -fn           font              Font
                               -foreground or -fg     foreground        Foreground
                               -geometry              geometry          Geometry
                               -iconic                iconic            Iconic
                               -ls                    loginShell        LoginShell
                               -msg                   messages          Messages
                               -n                     iconName          IconName
                               -name                  -                 -
                               -rv                    reverseVideo      ReverseVideo
                               -rw                    reverseWrap       ReverseWrap
                               -sb                    scrollBar         ScrollBar
                               -sf                    sunFunctionKeys   SunFunctionKeys
                               -sl                    saveLines         SaveLines
                               -title or -T           title             Title
                               -8 (on) and -7 (off)   eightBitInput     EightBitInput

NAMES TITLES AND ICON NAMES

       One  occasionally  confusing  aspect  of  xvt and other X applications is the collection of names that an
       application window can have and the relationship between the names and the command line options  used  to
       set them.  This section attempts to make the situation a bit clearer in the case of xvt.

       In  fact,  each  terminal  window has three names, its resource name, its title and its icon name.  These
       three names are distinct and have different functions, although they usually have the  same  value.   The
       resource  name  is  the  command  name used to identify X resource options in the resources database, The
       title is the text that is displayed in the title bar, if there is one, and the icon name is the name that
       appears in the window's icon or represents it in the icon manager window.

       The  rule about which option sets which name is that -name and -e set both the title and the icon name in
       addition to their main function and -n sets the title as well as the icon name.  Conflicts  are  resolved
       by  giving  the  options priorities which are, in increasing order, -e, -name, -n and -title.  Hence, for
       example, -e only sets the title if none of the other options is used.

THE SCROLL BAR

       Lines of text that scroll off the top of the xvt window are saved automatically (up to a  preset  maximum
       number)  and  can  be  viewed  by  scrolling them back into the window with the scrollbar.  The scrollbar
       itself can be displayed or hidden by clicking any mouse button in  the  window  while  holding  down  the
       CONTROL  key  on  the  keyboard.  When using the scrollbar, the left and right mouse buttons are used for
       scrolling by a few lines at a time and the middle button is used for continuous scrolling.   To  use  the
       middle  button,  press  it  in the scroll bar and hold it down.  the central shaded part of the scrollbar
       will then attach itself to the cursor and can be slid up or down to show different parts of the  sequence
       of saved lines.  When scrolling with the left and right buttons, the left button is used to scroll up and
       the right is used to scroll down.  Assuming that there are enough hidden  lines,  the  distance  scrolled
       with  either button is equal to the number of lines between the cursor and the top of the window.  Hence,
       pressing the left cursor opposite a line of text will result in that line being moved to be  the  top  of
       the  window and pressing the right button will cause the top line to be moved down so that it is opposite
       the cursor.

TEXT SELECTION AND INSERTION

       Xvt uses the same kind of text selection and insertion mechanism as xterm.  Pressing  and  releasing  the
       middle  mouse  button in an xvt window causes the current text selection to be inserted as if it had been
       typed on the keyboard.  For the insertion to take place, both the button press  and  the  button  release
       need to be done with the cursor in the xvt window.

       The  left  and  right  mouse  buttons are used to select text, with the left button being used to start a
       selection and the right button being used to modify an  existing  selection.   Any  continuous  block  of
       displayed  text  can  be  selected.   If  both  ends of the text block are visible in the window then the
       easiest way to select it is to position the cursor at one end and press the left mouse button, then  drag
       the  cursor  to  the  other  end  with the button held down before releasing the button.  If the block is
       larger than the window then you must first use the left mouse button to select  one  end,  then  use  the
       scroll  bar  to  scroll  the  other  end  into  view and finally use the right mouse button to extend the
       selection.  The effect of pressing the right mouse button is to move  the  nearest  end  of  the  current
       selection to the current cursor position.

       The  other way to make selections in xvt is to use double and triple clicks of the left mouse button with
       a double click selecting a word and a triple click selecting a whole line.  For this purpose, a word is a
       sequence of characters in the same class.  The default character classes are:

       +  the upper and lower case letters, digits and '_' (underscore) all in one class;

       +  the white space characters all in one class;

       +  each of the remaining punctuation characters in a class by itself.

       If  you  want  to  change the character classes so that, for example, you can select a UNIX pathname or a
       mail address in one double click, then you can do so  by  using  the  -cc  command  line  option  or  the
       charClass  X  resource.   Multiple  clicking  can  be  combined  with  dragging  to  select a sequence of
       consecutive words or lines.

       Although xvt essentially mimics the behaviour of xterm in its support of text  selection  and  insertion,
       there are a couple of minor differences:

       +  xvt  respects  TAB  characters in selected text and does not automatically convert them into spaces as
          does xterm;

       +  xvt will let you abort a text insertion if you realise you have made a mistake  before  releasing  the
          middle mouse button.

BUGS

       Pasting very large quantities of text does not work.

AUTHOR

       John Bovey, University of Kent, 1992 and 1993.