The vidi command
loads or extracts a font or sets the video mode for
the console.
When vidi is used without arguments, it lists
all valid video mode and font commands.
Font options
Some video cards support changeable character fonts.
Available fonts are ``font8x8'', ``font8x14'', and ``font8x16''.
The font options are used as follows:
vidifont
Load font from /usr/lib/vidi/font.
vidi -dfont
Write font to the standard output.
vidi -ffontfilefont
Load font from fontfile instead of default directory.
Mode options
vidi also sets the mode of the video adapter connected
to the standard input.
The modes are:
mono
Move current screen to the monochrome adapter.
cga
Move current screen to the Color Graphics adapter.
ega
Move current screen to the Enhanced Graphics adapter.
vga
Move current screen to the Video Graphics adapter.
Text and graphics modes
The following tables list the available modes.
Text Modes
Mode
Cols
Rows
Font
Adapter
c40x25
40
25
8x8
CGA (EGA VGA)
e40x25
40
25
8x14
EGA (VGA)
v40x25
40
25
8x16
VGA
m80x25
80
25
8x14
MONO (EGA_MONO VGA_MONO)
c80x25
80
25
8x8
CGA (EGA VGA)
em80x25
80
25
8x14
EGA_MONO (VGA_MONO)
e80x25
80
25
8x14
EGA (VGA)
vm80x25
80
25
8x16
VGA_MONO
v80x25
80
25
8x16
VGA
e80x43
80
43
8x14
EGA (VGA)
Graphics Modes
Mode
Pixel Resolution
Colors
mode5
320x200
4
mode6
640x200
2
modeD
320x200
16
modeE
640x200
16
modeF
640x350
2 (mono)
mode10
640x350
16
mode11
640x480
2
mode12
640x480
16
mode13
320x200
256
att640
640x400
16
att800x600
800x600
16
att640x400
640x400
256
When using the vidi command to set modes,
if the error message Invalid argument or
No such device or address is displayed,
either the user doesn't have permission to change the mode or
the video hardware doesn't support the mode specified.
For example, the mode value ``vm80x25'' is not valid for
a system configured with an EGA video adapter.
The format of a data file for a font is an array of bytes where
each byte represents one line of the pixel image for the character.
The bits within the byte are ``1'' if the pixel should be drawn and
``0'' if it shouldn't be.
For example,
for an 8x14 font,
14 consecutive bytes are needed to represent the pixel image
for the character.
The bytes are ordered top to bottom.
For every font file, 256 pixel images are provided with
the images ordered from 0 to 255.
For example, the 8x14 font contains 14*256 bytes.
The first 14 bytes are displayed for ASCII value ``\0'',
the next 14 bytes are for ASCII value ``\001'', and so on.