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Eugene Yarmash
Asked: 2012-08-23 23:46:22 +0800 CST

How can I scroll back the output in FreeBSD's console without Scroll Lock?

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I've installed FreeBSD inside a VM on a laptop. As it turns out, the laptop keyboard has no Scroll Lock key, which is used for scrolling the screen back in FreeBSD's console. How can I scroll back the output without Scroll Lock?

freebsd

3 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    As root, dump the keyboard map to a file

    kbdcontrol -d > mykeys

    Change the file so "Ctrl+NumLock" will set "Scroll Lock". Find line with scancode "base" 069, or where "nlock" fills the entire line. Edit column 3 from "nlock" to "slock". The line now looks like:

    "069   nlock  nlock  slock  nlock  nlock  nlock  nlock  nlock   O"

    As root, issue the command:

    kbdcontrol -l mykeys

    The solution was found here.

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  2. Laptop keyboards usually have a Fn key so that keys on a normal PC keyboard can be replicated. You should find that some combination of Fn and another key (hint: look for the blue text on your keys) will perform Scroll Lock. For instance, on my cheap netbook, Fn-F12 performs Scroll Lock.

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  3. I use tmux for that, you can install it from ports under /usr/ports/sysutils/tmux. Ctrl-b PgUp and Ctrl-b PgDn allow to scroll the console output in tmux. BTW, tmux has other great features, basically it is an advanced screen replacement.

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