(solved by tce) ctrl alt f1, f2 makes tc inaccessible

[tobiaus]

like dsl, tc has two screens, which i'll refer to as caf1 (ctrl alt f1) and caf2 (ctrl alt f2) for the shortcuts.

what i've done before is quit x to go back to caf1 then startx & which lets me use caf1 while xwin is caf2.

another thing i've done is switch to caf1 then ctrl-c to close x, then startx &

however, in trying these out, i found that simply switching to caf1 then caf2 will make it impossible to access anything in tc. the screen will change all one color (depending on settings, all white or all black) and no keyboard shortcuts seem to do anything then, after that there isn't even a way to get back to caf1, which is the screen you have just before x starts anyway. i tried ctrl alt backspace, and ctrl c, those didn't help.

i have only tried this on one computer, but it's not a problem i've had on this computer before. i realize as bugs go, this is probably not the most interesting, but i wish i knew more about it.

[hjkl]

Hi tobiaus,

I am glad that you asked about this.  I also have the same problem:

By pressing 'Ctrl+Alt+F1', I get out of X while it is running.  Then,
I try to go back to X by pressing 'Alt+F2'.  After that, my computer stops working.

It seems that it happens on TinyCore RC8.  RC7 does not have this issue.
When I found that out, I used 'diff' to compare RC7 and RC8.  It appears that
Xvesa is different from TinyCore RC7's Xvesa.

[tobiaus]

I am glad that you asked about this.  I also have the same problem...

i was interested in your tinycore "my way" posts, because i love having fullscreen tty's without leaving xwin. as far as i know, old versionsof knoppix, dsl, and tc do not offer them. however, i'd rather see if it's possible with the distro proper (for example, by using the method i mentioned) than remix tc myself.

It seems that it happens on TinyCore RC8.  RC7 does not have this issue.
When I found that out, I used 'diff' to compare RC7 and RC8.  It appears that
Xvesa is different from TinyCore RC7's Xvesa.

great to know, and very interesting in and of itself. how did i miss this when i read the official post about rc8? obviously it was the excitement, it was the first item listed.

edit: you're right, it's xvesa. i installed the xvesa tce extension and now rc8 lets me switch from one tty to another, and quit and startx & so that being able to switch is more useful.

[curaga]

It's size versus usability here; VT switch is a feature many users will not need, and so the older Xvesa, though not  having the features of VT switch and numlock led, is significantly smaller and is therefor in TC.

[tobiaus]

not in disagreement. the xvesa used in tc is probably the best xvesa for tc.

i'm very pleased that not only is there an xvesa tce, but that it's proven useful for the people that need it. nonetheless, xvesa was the issue, and the tce solves it.

[hjkl]

By pressing 'Ctrl+Alt+F1', I get out of X while it is running.  Then,
I try to go back to X by pressing 'Alt+F2'.  After that, my computer stops working.

I don't see this behavior on TinyCore any more.

b8daab6e39f01f5664cb80ea14aadb5f  tinycore_1.0.iso

It works out of the box.  Thank you for fixing this problem.

[roberts]

Yes. I forgot to mention in the change log. Thanks to Jason for a rebuild of Xvesa that supports this.

[tobiaus]

thanks again!