Is there a way to change the screen resolution of the console after the system has been booted? I've seen plenty on setting the vga= line in the boot and in the grub config but I'd like to be able to change it after I login instead. This would be logging into the console, not through SSH.
in the old days of DOS I would have just used "mode" and changed it. What's the unix counterpart?
In newer kernels, the ability to set vga= on the kernel line is disappearing anyway. It's gone for Intel video with the latest kernel/X11 releases already. When these will show up in Ubuntu I don't know.
You're talking the resolution in the console, right? Not the resolution inside X? If the former, I'm not sure it can be done. I've never seen anyone talk about doing it. If the latter, different desktop environments provide control panels for doing this, so I surmise it is possible. :-) You should say more about what the constraints are.
Have you taken a look at resizecons? Also, see this.