PART C. Framebuffer Programs
This list consists (mostly) of terminal programs which use framebuffer to show images, web pages, videos etc. You can do all these without using X at all!
1. To enable mouse support in the terminal install gpm:
Code:
sudo apt-get install gpm
Then edit
Code:
sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/40-permissions.rules
and add the following line to the end:
Code:
KERNEL=="mice", MODE="0666"
and restart.
You can select text to copy and middle-click to paste. This also works between different terminals. For example select a text in tty1, then press (ctrl+)alt+F3 and middle-click to paste in tty3.
To enable mouse support in nano edit the /etc/nanorc file and comment out the line "set mouse". "When enabled, mouse clicks can be used to place the cursor, set the mark (with a double click), and execute shortcuts."
2. links2 is a webbrowser which can use framebuffer:
Code:
sudo apt-get install links2
Now start with
to get the graphical version.
On a side note, see also surfraw which is a frontend to various web search pages including wikipedia & google.
http://surfraw.alioth.debian.org/
3. To see images install fbi:
Code:
sudo apt-get install fbi
Then use for example
in a directory with images.
4. To read pdf also use fbi which needs imagemagick to show pdf files:
Code:
sudo apt-get install fbi imagemagick
Now
will do the job.
Another program is fbgs - "poor man's PostScript/pdf viewer for the linux framebuffer console" which also works quite good.
Note that there is a good command line pdf maniplation program: pdftk.
5. You can use mplayer (or mplayer-nogui) to watch videos:
Code:
sudo apt-get install mplayer
Now I can watch videos with
Code:
mplayer -vo fbdev -fs -vf scale=1280:-3 FileName
mplayer -vo fbdev -fs -vf scale=-3:1024 FileName
Use the first one if the width of the video is larger than the height. Otherwise, use second. I have an alias in .bashrc so I don't have to remember them.
My framebuffer resolution is 1280x1024. Change the commands above for your resolution accordingly.
6. I cannot get vlc and xine to work with framebuffer. In theory they should work. When I try to use vlc with one of
Code:
vlc video_file
vlc --vout fb video_file
something weird happens. It plays the video as ascii animation. It uses only the text console! It's really fun. You've got to see it to believe it.
But there is a problem. I don't know how to stop the video! To stop I goto ALT+F2 console and kill vlc from there. This leaves the original terminal (ALT+F1) in a weird state so to get it back use the command
7. There are good music players around. I prefer MOC (Music On Console). It plays everything and you can change the config file to your liking. It even uses themes. (Note that you install the package named "moc" but you start it with "mocp").
I don't know any music player which uses framebuffer.
8. For terminal programs in general see the links given in Part B-11 of this howto.
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