Certification Objective 4.09: Virtual Consoles

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As Red Hat Enterprise Linux is a multiterminal operating system, you can log into Linux, even with the same user ID, several times. This is made possible through the use of virtual consoles.

It's easy to open up a new virtual console. Just use the appropriate ALT-function key combination. For example, pressing the ALT key and F2 at the same time brings you to the second virtual console. You can switch between adjacent virtual consoles by pressing ALT-RIGHT ARROW or ALT-LEFT ARROW. For example, to move from virtual console 2 to virtual console 3, press ALT-RIGHT ARROW.

/etc/inittab

Virtual consoles are configured in the init configuration file, /etc/inittab. By default, Red Hat Enterprise Linux is configured with six virtual consoles. You can add up to six more virtual consoles in /etc/inittab. Here are the default /etc/inittab entries for the first six virtual consoles:

1:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty1 2:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty2 3:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty3 4:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty4 5:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty5 6:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty6

Virtual consoles really bring the multiuser capabilities of Linux to life. You can be viewing a man page on one console, compiling a program in another, and editing a document in yet a third virtual console. Other users who are connected through a network can do the same thing at the same time.

The Graphical Console

The GUI is, in one way, just another console. By default, six virtual consoles are configured with Linux, so the GUI is next in line, at console 7. To switch from the GUI to a regular virtual console, press CTRL-ALT-Fx, where x represents one of the other virtual consoles.

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