libvga.config(5)

NAME
libvga.config - the svgalib configuration file

DESCRIPTION
The svgalib configuration is usually located in /etc/vga/libvga.config though one can reconfigure this location when recompiling svgalib. In the configuration file, everything between a # and the end of the line is ignored. Empty lines are also ignored. Since the driver you will use may not know all config options here, unknown commands are silently ignored. Please think of that when something does not work as you expect. I know this is a nuisance because misformed configuration statements do not cause errors. Multiple commands are allowed in one line, and commands can exceed lines. Actually, svgalib simply reads a list of whitespace separated tokens from the file until it finds one it knows and it then assumes the following tokens to be arguments of that command until one is encountered which may not be an argument. New style options are in general case insensitive whereas the old style options are case sensitive. The old style options are included to allow for old config files still being used. For completeness they are documented in the OBSOLETE COMMANDS section. You should not use them anymore. The environment variable SVGALIB_CONFIG is parsed like a line in this file after the real config file is parsed. Note that most config commands are disabled in SVGALIB_CONFIG for safety by default (s.t. a non root user can not cause any harm to your hardware by misconfiguring svgalib(7)). Enable them with the command overrideenable in the config file. WARNING! his allows every user to change the monitor and clocks (and other configs) and thus damaging the hardware. I strongly discourage the use of overrideenable except for debugging/testing purposes.

REQUIRED CONFIGURATION
Please do not allow the vastness of options to confuse you. Generally svgalib uses well choosen defaults and is able to autodetect everything. Thus generally you don't need to specify much. When installing svgalib it provides a sample /etc/vga/libvga.config file which contains most of the required configuration. Just edit it to your needs. Generally you only need to use:

mouse
    To specify if you use anything else then a Microsoft compatible mouse.

mdev
    If the mouse device file is not /dev/mouse which is generally a symbolic link to the actual mouse device file. You will usually need to use this command if you want to use the SpaceTec Spaceball device (which is not your usual mouse).

setRTS, clearRTS, leaveRTS, setDTR, clearDTR, and leaveDTR
    if your mouse needs it to enter your desired mouse protocol.

monitor, or (better) HorizSync and VertRefresh
    to specify the capabilities of your monitor.

  If you use the EGA chipset driver

monotext or colortext
    to specify if your EGA card is in monochrome or color configuration.

  If you use the Mach32 chipset driver
You should consider reading svgalib.mach32(7).

Clocks clock1 clock2 clock3 ...
    to specify the Mach32 clocks. This is mandatory. However, if you omit it. svgalib will autodetect clocks and modify your /etc/vga/libvga.config file and abort. After this, every svgalib application started will find the proper Clocks command.

mach32eeprom /etc/vga/mach32.eeprom
    is recommended to avoid slowish reads of the Mach32 EEPROM which will also cause annoying screen flickering.

  If you use the Mach64 chipset driver

Chipset Mach64
    if you want to use the experimental pre-alpha driver

  If you use the S3 chipset driver
I don't have much knowledge on the S3, but it seems to me that you need:

Clocks clock1 clock2 ...
    to specify the clocks (take them from your Xfree86 configuration).

or

ClockChip icd2061a number
    if you have an Icd2061a clockchip.

Ramdac chipname
    if your Ramdac is not detected properly.

Dacspeed speed
    if the default choosen is not right (probably too restrictive).

The remaining options are really only to be used in case of problems which you'll not generally encounter.

GENERAL OPTIONS (HANDLED BY THE MAIN MODULE)

  Mouse configuration

mouse mousetype
    where mousetype is one of: Microsoft, MouseSystems, MMSeries, Logitech, Busmouse, PS2, MouseMan, gpm, Spaceball, or none. mousetype can also be a number (0 - 9) for the keywords Microsoft - none. gpm allows for (hopefully) peaceful interaction with gpm, Spaceball enables support for the 6-axes Spacetec Spaceball mouse (well, probably more like a trackball).

Define ALLOW_MOUSE_OVERRIDE in Makefile.cfg when compiling svgalib to recognize the SVGA_MOUSE_OVERRIDE environment variable (this feature is usually enabled). If this environment variable is set then ignore the program's specified mouse type in any call to svgalib and use the configuration file's type. In particular, DOOM does not understand MouseMan as a valid mouse type and so defaults the mouse type to MouseSystems.

SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_THRESH and SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_MULT environment variables.
    These environment variables allow to set a mouse acceleration multiplier and threshhold. They are no commands for the config file (most probably config options to set them should be implemented too), but lacking a better place we discuss them here. SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_THRESH must be an integer in range 1 to 255. SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_MULT must be a float in any format acceptible by C in range 1.0 (exclusively) to 10.0 (inclusively). Both may be unset or set to "0" to turn the acceleration feature off. When SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_THRESH is greater than zero, when ever the mouse reports a movement of more than SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_THRESH pixels in one chunk, the result is multiplied by SVGA_MOUSE_ACCEL_MULT.

mdev mousedevice
    Usually /dev/mouse (the default) will be a link to the mouse device. However, esp. with the Spacetec Spaceball you may want to specify a different device for svgalib(7) to use: mdev /dev/ttyS0 # mouse is at /dev/ttyS0

Some multiprotocol mice use the state of RTS and DTR to find out which protocol to enable:

setRTS
    set the RTS wire.

clearRTS
    clear the RTS wire.

leaveRTS
    leave the RTS wire alone (default) (Wire is usually set)

setDTR
    set the DTR wire.

clearDTR
    clear the DTR wire.

leaveDTR
    leave the DTR wire alone (default) (Wire is usually set)

For example my mouse can emulate Microsoft and MouseSystems. It needs a low RTS to go into MouseSystems mode. Thus I use: mouse MouseSystems clearRTS Still I could just use mouse Microsoft and use the mouse with that protocol.. But then only 2 buttons instead of 3 are supported (not that I know many svgalib programs that uses more than 2 buttons.) Other mice might need clearDTR as well or one set and clear. Try yourself. Note: Having crtscts handshake enabled on the mouse tty may interfer with this options. Do not do that.

  Monitor configuration
HorizSync min_kHz max_kHz
VertRefresh min_Hz max_Hz
    specifies the range of frequencies acceptable to your monitor. They obsolete the monitor settings below, and this shouldn't be used if HorizSync and VertRefresh are defined. Examples: HorizSync 31.5 35.5
    VertRefresh 50 70

monitor monitor_class
    where monitor_class is a digit 0 - 6 or the maximal horizontal frequency in kHz. Examples: monitor 0 # Max horizontal sync is 31.5 kHz
    monitor 1 # Max horizontal sync is 35.1 kHz
    monitor 2 # Max horizontal sync is 35.5 kHz
    monitor 3 # Max horizontal sync is 37.9 kHz
    monitor 4 # Max horizontal sync is 48.3 kHz
    monitor 5 # Max horizontal sync is 56.0 kHz
    monitor 6 # No restrictions. For your convenience you may specify the max horizontal sync explicitly. The correct class will the be chosen. You may use floats consisting of digits and a decimal point for this too: monitor 40.0 # equivalent to monitor 3 This command is not allowed in SVGALIB_CONFIG by default.

  Mode timings
It is now possible to define modetimings for some cards (see the info on your card in svgalib(7)). The syntax is:

modeline label pxcl HDsp HSS HSE HTot VDsp VSS VSE VTot flags

    label  string
        (ignored by svgalib) mainly there to be compatible with XF86Config. I use the format "Width x Height @ Vert.Refresh", but that's just personal taste...

    pxcl   float
        the pixel clock in MHz
    HDsp
    VDsp   integer
        size of the visible area (horizontal/vertical)
    HSS
    VSS    integer
        Sync start (horizontal/vertical)
    HSE
    VSE    integer
        Sync end (horizontal/vertical)
    HTot
    VTot   integer
        Total width/height (end of back porch)

    flags  +hsync -hsync +vsync -vsync interlace interlaced
        Sync polarity, interlace mode
Everything should be on one line. The values for the horizontal timings must be multiples of eight. These are prefered over the default timings (if monitor and chipset can handle them). The format is identical to the one used by XFree86, but the label following the modeline keyword is ignored by vgalib. Here some examples: modeline 640x480@100 43 640 664 824 848 480 483 490 504
modeline 800x600@73 50 800 856 976 1024 600 637 643 666
modeline 1024x768@75 85 1024 1048 1376 1400 768 771 780 806
IMPORTANT! Not all drivers, that is SVGA cards, use the values. Only drivers using timing.c. As of this writing, drivers using this feature are: Ark, Cirrus, Chips & Technologies, S3. The Mach32 driver provides a similar feature separately, you have to use the define command described below. ET4000 (and to some extent EGA) allow to use a binary file created by some utility. All other chipset driver use predefined timings that are hardcoded in register dumps within the drivers. See svgalib.et4000(7) for more information.

  Chipset detection
Usually svgalib does a good job autodetecting your hardware. However, if auto detection fails (or you want to fall back to a simpler driver, say VGA, as a bug work around), you may force detection of your chipset with

chipset type
    where type is (currently) one of: VGA, ET4000, Cirrus, TVGA, Oak, EGA, S3, ET3000, Mach32, GVGA6400, ARK, ATI, ALI, Mach64, and C&T. You can also specify a number in range 1 - 15 to specify the type-th chipset type or 0 to enforce autodetection. Warning, incorrect settings may damage your hardware. This command is not allowed in SVGALIB_CONFIG by default.

chipset type param1 param2
    use this from if the size of memory or an additional configuration option is misdetected. For example: chipset Mach32 0 2048 Note that always two integers have to be specified. Usually (Mach32) the second parameter is the memory amount. Look at the *_init function of the specific device driver sources or information on that type of cards in svgalib(7). Note that there is a more convenient command setuplinear for enforcing specific memory-aperture configurations for Mach32 This form is also not allowed in SVGALIB_CONFIG by default.

  Specific options required for the EGA-driver.

monotext
    Card is in monochrome emulation mode

colortext
    Card is in color emulation mode This form is also not allowed in SVGALIB_CONFIG by default.

  RAMDAC configuration
Some chipsets (e.g. S3 and ARK) allow specifying a RAMDAC type. If your RAMDAC is not autodetected, you can try specifying it:
Ramdac Sierra32K
Ramdac SC15025
Ramdac SDAC
    S3 SDAC
Ramdac GenDAC
    S3 GenDAC
Ramdac ATT20C490
    AT&T 20C490, 491, 492 (and compatibles)
Ramdac ATT20C498
    AT&T 20C498
Ramdac IBMRGB52x
    IBM RGB524, 526, 528 (and compatibles)

BEWARE! The Mach32 driver features an own ramdac command (which is usually not required). If you have a Mach32, see svgalib.mach32(7).

Dacspeed speed
    speed is a floating point number in MHz (like in Dacspeed40.0") specifying the maximal allowable pixel clock of the Ramdac in use. Currently this option is only supported by the S3 driver. The Mach32 driver supports maxclock8, maxclock16, maxclock24, and maxclock32 commands which have a similar effect. Nevertheless, the Mach32 has a very good idea on the capabilities of the Ramdac in use. The settings are more intended to specify the VGA memory bandwidth.

  Pixel clocks

Clocks list of clock values as floats or ints
    Some chipsets need a list of dot clocks for optimum operation. Some includes or supports a programmable clock chip. You'll need to specify them here. Fixed clocks example: (The following is just an example, get the values for your card from you X setup) Clocks 25.175 28.3 40 70 50 75 36 44.9 0 118 77 31.5 110 65 72 93.5 BEWARE! The Clocks command for the Mach32 features only integer clocks. Please round your clocks to the next integer data. The Mach32 only uses these values to check monitor requirements and to compare the quality of modes. The rounding errors are of no importance there as the difference in the resulting monitor timings is barely measurable. See the Mach32 section below.

Clockchip ICD2061A
    Configure for a programmable clockchip. ICD2061A is the only one supported right now.

  Miscanellous options

security revoke-all-privs
    Make sure it is impossible to regain root access after vga_init(3) was called. (default)

security compat
    For compatibility to pre 1.2.11, do not close a security hole using saved uids.

verbose
    Mach32: show messages while processing all info to build up a mode table.

quiet
    Turn verbose messages off (default).

nolinear
    Inhibit use of a linear mmaped frame buffer.

linear
    Allow (not enforce!) use of a linear mmaped frame buffer.

overrideenable
    Allow "dangerous" commands in SVGALIB_CONFIG.

  Common options currently used by Mach32 only
Options that may be useful for all drivers, but currently are only supported by Mach32 (Please read svgalib.mach32(7) if you use one):

maxclock16 maxclk
    The maximum pixel clock to use for 16bpp modes. This is used by Mach32 to find out which settings may be used for 16bpp modes. the Mach32 default for this is 2000, thus it is effectively switched off. maxclk must be an integer.

maxclock24 maxclk
    The maximum clock to use for 24bpp modes. (see above) Experience showed that the Mach32 default 49 is good for my 2MB VRAM card.

maxclock32 maxclk
    The same for 32bpp modes (24bpp with one fill byte for faster memory access (not fully implemented (esp. for Mach32) yet). Mach32 default (good for my VRAM card) is 39.

maxclock8 maxclk
    Just for completeness the same for 8bpp modes (I doubt anyone needs it), default is 2000 to disable this feature.

Thes maxclock commands are usually not allowed in the environment variable.

clocks list of clocks
    Sets the frequencies of the clocks the chips can generate. Exactly 16 values have to be specified for mach32. Use 0 to disable a specific clock. Note that the mach32 can divide clocks by 2. Thus there are actually 32 clocks And you can also use the divided clocks in a define command. On contrary to Xfree96 or the clocks command above only integers are allowed for Mach32. Simply round them to the nearest integer. This line is mandatory for Mach32. If it is not there it will be auto detected and added at the beginning of the config file. The program will then exit and when you start it next, everything should be ok. Common clock values for Mach32:

    Clock chip 18811-0:
        clocks 43 49 92 36 50 56 0 45
        30 32 110 80 40 45 75 65

    Clock chip 18811-1:
        due to Xfree86 info valid for: Ultra pro ISA, Ultra pro EISA, Ultra pro VLB(68800-3) clocks 100 126 92 36 50 56 0 45
        135 32 110 80 40 45 75 65

    Clock chip 1881 (ICS2494):
        due to Xfree86 info valid for: Ultra pro VLB (6880006) clocks 18 22 25 28 36 44 50 56
        30 32 37 39 40 0 75 65

    In my own correspondence with ATI they say every Mach32 would have a 18811-1, so it should be possible just to take the 18811-1 line. However I have now reports of third party cards and motherboards with on board Mach32 chips, so be careful. Please read svgalib.mach32(7) for additional info on clocks. The clocks command is usually not allowed in the environment variable.

variablelinelength
    Sometimes a mode cannot be realized with the logical linelength = pixels in a row * bytes per pixel. (definitely true for Mach32 800x600). The default behavior of Mach32 is to adjust xbytes (see vga_getmodeinfo(3)) in the info table appropriately. This command enforces this default operation and adjusts xbytes appropriately, thus overriding the standard svgalib mode. This may yield to problems with ..umm.. not well designed applications.

duplicatelinelength
    Don't touch the standard mode but create an exact copy, a dynamic mode, with the adjusted xbytes value. Expect noise at some pixels in 800x600 for more than 256 colors on Mach32 when not using the dynamic mode.

strictlinelength
    Same as above but delete the standard mode thus creating the non conforming xbytes modes only as dynamic modes.

To enforce the standard linelength for non-conforming modes use setlinelength below. All linelength commands are always allowed in the environment variable. In the following commands a mode is specified with horzXvertXcolors. Valid settings for colors in the mach32 driver are: 256, 32K, 64K, 16M, 16M4. 16M4 is for the 16M colors with 32bpp modes. These are expected to support slightly faster drawing. Examples: 640x480x256, 1024x768x64K, etc...

inhibit mode1 [mode2 mode3...]
    Switch the specified SVGA-Modes off. For example: inhibit 800x600x32K 800x600x64K 800x600x16M disallows the maybe toasted mach32 800x600 modes. The inhibit command is always allowed in the environment variable.

setlinelength length mode1 [mode2 mode3...]
    Force the logical line length (xbytes) in the given modes to length pixels (not bytes!). See also variablelinelength, strictlinelength, and duplicatelinelength above. For example: setlinelength 800 800x600x32K 800x600x64K 800x600x16M sets the linelength, and thus xbytes, for the 800x600 modes to the equivalent of 800 pixels. For Mach32 this will give badly designed applications an 800x600 with which they can cope. However, the Mach32 will generate a noisy video signal in some configurations. The setlinelength command is always allowed in the environment variable.

define mode1 [mode2 mode3...] clock horz_timing vert_timing flags
    where clock is a clock in MHz (as an integer! Has to be known by the driver. (one of the set clocks, or the exact half of one)). Only clocks in a clocks command issued before the define can be used. You may use :n to specify the n-thclock (n = 0 .. 31 for mach32). horz_timing is four integers: hdisp h_sync_strt h_sync_wid h_total. vert_timing has the same format but for vertical. You may specify one or more flags out of: Interlace, +vsync, -vsync, +hsync, or -hsync to select interlace mode and polarity of sync signals. This format is almost the same Xfree uses, s.t. you may use their mode table and the modegen spreadsheet package for mode creation. You simple need to round the clock to the next integer, add the resolution instead of the timing name for Xfree and replace the modeline keyword with define. Here is a 1024x768x256 mode as example: define 1024x768x256 80 1024 1024 1184 1312
    768 768 772 791 +vsync -hsync or define 1024x768x256 1024x768x32K 1024x768x64K
    :11 1024 1024 1184 1312 768 768 772 791 (yes any whitespace in a command is allowed, even a newline !) Both commands define the same timings (if the 11-th clock is 80) but the first explicitly specifies the polarity of sync signals whereas the second declares that these timings are also to be used for a 32K and 64K mode. The define command is usually not allowed in the environment variable.

There is one really dangerous option (except faking clocks). Please use it only if you are sure what you are doing. Wrong setup will lead to multiple components accessing your bus at once and thus to probable hardware damage:

setuplinear address size
    Sets up a linear frame buffer at address of size size (both are given in MB). If the values make sense (for example address <16MB for ISA cards) the linear aperture is setup. Since the Mach32-driver auto detects configured address itself, I strongly discourage use of this command. However I was asked for it as some PCI mach32-cards didn't setup the linear aperture correctly. Please ensure that the address range from address to address + size (exclusively) is not used in your system. Obey that due to memory remapping for example 16MB Ram may exceed the 16MB address limit. Valid Mach32 values for size are 1 and 4 (only 4 in PCI configurations), address + size have to be below 16MB for ISA, 4GB for multiplexed PCI, and 128MB else. Example: (my setup) setuplinear 64 4 for a 4MB linear frame buffer at address 0x4000000. It is also valid to specify setuplinear 0 0. This will actually disable/de-configure any linear frame buffer. Useful to disable mach32 aperture even if it is enabled in the EEPROM. The setuplinear command is usually not allowed in the environment variable.

blit subcommand1 subcommand2 ...
    This is a command to control the Mach32 support for oldstyle accelerator functions. Valid subcommands are bit, fill, image, and hlinelist. They enable support for the corresponding blit functions. Preceed them with no to turn them off (no space after no allowed). Use memimage to emulate the image blit using a linearframebuffer, which is usually much faster for Mach32. Use nomemimage to never use this emulation. On the Mach32 this emulation can be used in more resolutions than the actual imageblit accelerator function. Again order is vital! (esp. for the *image commands). As the Mach32 now has also new style vga_accel(3) support there are now also the subcommands: settrans, setrop, fillbox, screencopy, drawline, putimage, drawhlinelist, putbitmap, screencopymono, setmode, polyline, polyhline, and polyfillmode. Which are also supported with a leading no. They allow to control support for the subfunctions of vga_accel(3). In addition, memimage emulation applies to putimage as well. Some examples:

    blit image nomemimage
        Use IO-style imageblt where possible. Don't emulate it in any resolution.

    blit image memimage
        Use emulated imageblt where possible.

    blit memimage image
        Use IO-style imageblt where possible, and the emulation where possible in the remaining modes.

    blit noimage
        Disable support for imageblt.

    Mach32 default is: blit bit fill image hlinelist settrans setrop
    fillbox screencopy drawline putimage
    drawhlinelist putbitmap screencopymono
    setmode polyline polyhline polyfillmode
    memimage The blit command is always allowed in the environment variable.

The Mach32 has also a few intermediate debug options for low level timing adjust. They are: vfifo8 number
vfifo16 number
vfifo24 number
vfifo32 number
blank number
latch number There also options which are useful to support broken Mach32 cards or third party hardware based on Mach32 which does not follow the ATI specifications completely. For example: vendor ati
misc_ctl keep-off
svgaclocks 9
ramdac auto For details about these options see svgalib.mach32(7). All these options are not allowed in the environment variable by default.

OBSOLETE COMMANDS
Very old svgalib versions used a different style configuration file. For compatibility, svgalib can still parse these old options. Generally the options consist of one character (case sensitive) followed by a number. Whitespace characters (space, tab, newline) can be used after the characters m and M and the number. The old svgalib versions actually allowed a new option character to follow a number immediately. The current parser requires white space after the numbers. Of course, you should not use these cryptic forms anymore. The obsolete commands are:

mnumber
    Specify the mouse type like mouse number does.

Mclass
    Specify the monitor class like monitor class does.

Cnumber
    Force usage of the number-th chipset driver from the list of supported drivers VGA(1), ET4000(2), Cirrus(3), TVGA(4), Oak(5), EGA(6), S3(7), ET3000(8), Mach32(9), GVGA6400(10), ARK(11), ATI(12), ALI(13), Mach64(14), and C&T(15). C0 reenables auto detection of the chipset (default).

cflag
    When using the EGA chipset driver, the card is in monochrome emulation mode for flag = 0 and in color emulation mode for flag = 1.

FILES
/etc/vga/libvga.config
/etc/vga/libvga.et4000

SEE ALSO
svgalib(7), svgalib.et4000(7), svgalib.chips(7), svgalib.mach32(7),

AUTHOR
The newstyle configuration file was first implemented and documented by Michael Weller <eowmob@exp-math.uni-essen.de>. However, other people added new features. Finally this page was edited by Michael Weller <eowmob@exp-math.uni-essen.de>.