loadkeys(1) — Linux manual page

NAME \| SYNOPSIS \| DESCRIPTION \| RESET TO DEFAULT \| LOAD KERNEL KEYMAP \| LOAD KERNEL ACCENT TABLE \| LOAD KERNEL STRING TABLE \| CREATE KERNEL SOURCE TABLE \| CREATE BINARY KEYMAP \| CREATE TEXT KEYMAP \| UNICODE MODE \| OTHER OPTIONS \| WARNING \| FILES \| SEE ALSO \| COLOPHON

LOADKEYS(1)              General Commands Manual              LOADKEYS(1)

NAME top

       loadkeys - load keyboard translation tables

SYNOPSIS top

       loadkeys [OPTION]... FILENAME...
       loadkeys --default
       loadkeys --mktable
       loadkeys --bkeymap
       loadkeys --tkeymap[=shape]
       loadkeys --parse

DESCRIPTION top

       The program loadkeys reads the file or files specified by
       FILENAME....  Its main purpose is to load the kernel keymap for
       the console.  You can specify console device by the -C (or
       --console ) option.

RESET TO DEFAULT top

       If the -d (or --default ) option is given, loadkeys loads a
       default keymap, probably the file defkeymap.map either in
       /usr/local/share/keymaps or in /usr/src/linux/drivers/tty/vt.
       (Probably the former was user-defined, while the latter is a
       qwerty keyboard map for PCs - maybe not what was desired.)
       Sometimes, with a strange keymap loaded (with the minus on some
       obscure unknown modifier combination) it is easier to type
       `loadkeys defkeymap.map'.

LOAD KERNEL KEYMAP top

       The main function of loadkeys is to load or modify the keyboard
       driver's translation tables.  When specifying the file names,
       standard input can be denoted by dash (-). If no file is
       specified, the data is read from the standard input.

       For many countries and keyboard types appropriate keymaps are
       available already, and a command like `loadkeys uk' might do what
       you want. On the other hand, it is easy to construct one's own
       keymap. The user has to tell what symbols belong to each key. She
       can find the keycode for a key by use of showkey(1), while the
       keymap format is given in keymaps(5) and can also be seen from the
       output of dumpkeys(1).

LOAD KERNEL ACCENT TABLE top

       If the input file does not contain any compose key definitions,
       the kernel accent table is left unchanged, unless the -c (or
       --clearcompose ) option is given, in which case the kernel accent
       table is emptied.  If the input file does contain compose key
       definitions, then all old definitions are removed, and replaced by
       the specified new entries.  The kernel accent table is a sequence
       of (by default 68) entries describing how dead diacritical signs
       and compose keys behave.  For example, a line

              compose ',' 'c' to ccedilla

       means that <ComposeKey><,><c> must be combined to <ccedilla>.  The
       current content of this table can be see using `dumpkeys
       --compose-only'.

LOAD KERNEL STRING TABLE top

       The option -s (or --clearstrings ) clears the kernel string table.
       If this option is not given, loadkeys will only add or replace
       strings, not remove them.  (Thus, the option -s is required to
       reach a well-defined state.)  The kernel string table is a
       sequence of strings with names like F31. One can make function key
       F5 (on an ordinary PC keyboard) produce the text `Hello!', and
       Shift+F5 `Goodbye!' using lines

              keycode 63 = F70 F71
              string F70 = "Hello!"
              string F71 = "Goodbye!"

       in the keymap.  The default bindings for the function keys are
       certain escape sequences mostly inspired by the VT100 terminal.

CREATE KERNEL SOURCE TABLE top

       If the -m (or --mktable ) option is given loadkeys prints to the
       standard output a file that may be used as
       /usr/src/linux/drivers/tty/vt/defkeymap.c, specifying the default
       key bindings for a kernel (and does not modify the current
       keymap).

CREATE BINARY KEYMAP top

       If the -b (or --bkeymap ) option is given loadkeys prints to the
       standard output a file that may be used as a binary keymap as
       expected by Busybox loadkmap command (and does not modify the
       current keymap).

CREATE TEXT KEYMAP top

       If the -t (or --tkeymap ) option is given loadkeys prints to the
       standard output a file that may be used as a text keymap as
       expected by loadkeys command (and does not modify the current
       keymap).  An optional argument can be used to select the shape of
       the output format: -tshape (or --tkeymap=shape ).

       Available shapes:

              2 default output.

              4 one line for each keycode.

              8 one line for each (modifier,keycode) pair.

              16 one line for each keycode until 1st hole.

UNICODE MODE top

       loadkeys automatically detects whether the console is in Unicode
       or ASCII (XLATE) mode.  When a keymap is loaded, literal keysyms
       (such as section) are resolved accordingly; numerical keysyms are
       converted to fit the current console mode, regardless of the way
       they are specified (decimal, octal, hexadecimal or Unicode).

       The -u (or --unicode) switch forces loadkeys to convert all
       keymaps to Unicode.  If the keyboard is in a non-Unicode mode,
       such as XLATE, loadkeys will change it to Unicode for the time of
       its execution.  A warning message will be printed in this case.

       It is recommended to run kbd_mode(1) before loadkeys instead of
       using the -u option.

OTHER OPTIONS top

       -a --ascii
              Force conversion to ASCII.

       -h --help
              loadkeys prints its version number and a short usage
              message to the programs standard error output and exits.

       -p --parse
              loadkeys searches and parses keymap without action.

       -q --quiet
              loadkeys suppresses all normal output.

       -V --version
              loadkeys prints version number and exits.

WARNING top

       Note that anyone having read access to /dev/console can run
       loadkeys and thus change the keyboard layout, possibly making it
       unusable. Note that the keyboard translation table is common for
       all the virtual consoles, so any changes to the keyboard bindings
       affect all the virtual consoles simultaneously.

       Note that because the changes affect all the virtual consoles,
       they also outlive your session. This means that even at the login
       prompt the key bindings may not be what the user expects.

FILES top

       /usr/local/share/keymaps
              default directory for keymaps.

       /usr/src/linux/drivers/tty/vt/defkeymap.map
              default kernel keymap.

COLOPHON top

       This page is part of the kbd (Linux keyboard tools) project.
       Information about the project can be found at 
       ⟨http://www.kbd-project.org/⟩.  If you have a bug report for this
       manual page, send it to kbd@lists.altlinux.org.  This page was
       obtained from the project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨https://github.com/legionus/kbd.git⟩ on 2025-08-11.  (At that
       time, the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
       repository was 2025-07-01.)  If you discover any rendering
       problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there is
       a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
       corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
       (which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
       man-pages@man7.org

kbd                             6 Feb 1994                    LOADKEYS(1)

Pages that refer to this page: dumpkeys(1), kbd_mode(1), localectl(1), setleds(1), setmetamode(1), showkey(1), unicode_start(1), ioctl_console(2), reboot(2), keymaps(5), vconsole.conf(5), setkeycodes(8), systemd-localed.service(8), systemd-vconsole-setup.service(8)