xawtv(1x)

Mouse functions

The left mouse button will popup a menu with all TV stations found in the config file. The middle button switches to the next station. The right button brings up a window with alot of options and control functions.

Keyboard Shortcuts

V            Video (Capture) on/off
A            Audio on/off
M            Mouse pointer on/off
F            Fullscreen on/off
G            Grab picture (full size, ppm)
J            Grab picture (full size, jpeg)
Ctrl+G       Grab picture (window size, ppm)
Ctrl+J       Grab picture (window size, jpeg)
O            Popup Options Window
C            Popup Channels Window
E            Popup Channel Editor
R            Popup AVI Recording Window
Z            Channel Hopper (zapping, tune in every station
             a few seconds)
Ctrl+Z       Fast Channel Hopping (grab the images for the Channel
             Window)
up/down      tune up/down one channel
left/right   fine tuning
pgup/pgdown  station up/down
space        next station (same as pgup)
backspace    previously tuned station
Ctrl+up      scan for next station
ESC,Q        Quit
+/-          Volume up/down
Enter        mute

config file

You can stick the channels into a config file ($HOME/.xawtv). Looks like this:

[ORB]
channel = 27

The branches hold some string (TV station ID), the lines below are the settings for that channel. The station ID "defaults" is a special case, this one sets the defaults for all channels. Usually the channel line is enouth for one station, all other settings can go to the "[defaults]" section.

Here is the detailed description of all options:

fine = n

finetuning (what left+right keys do), default: 0

norm = pal | ntsc | secam

which TV norm, default is pal

key = keysym

Hotkey for the channel. All X11 keysyms allowed here. You can prefix a keysym with Modifier+, i.e. ^F is "Ctrl+F".

capture = off | overlay | grabdisplay

capture mode: off, overlay (default, TV card => video, 0% cpu) or grabdisplay (TV card => main memory => X-Server => video, frame rate depends on load and picture size).

source = Television | Composite1 | Composite2 | SVHS

input source. The valid choices depend on the hardware driver, the values above are just examples.

color = n

bright = n

hue = n

contrast = n

Valid range is 0-65535, default is 32768

A few global settings go to the "[global]" section:

fullscreen = width x height

specify which video mode should be used for full-screen. Works with XFree only, and of cource you need a valid modeline for this mode in your XF86Config file.

wm-off-by = [+-]x[+-]y

Some WM's handle static gravity not correct (I know mwm and kwm). This is somewhat boring with fullscreen mode. With this options you can correct this with a displacement for moving windows. For example, wm-off-by = -4-24 does the trick for kwm (the KDE window manager).

freqtab =

select a channel-to-freqency mapping. Options window->Frequency table brings up a menu with all valid entries (and allows table-switching at runtime).

pixsize = width x height

size of the channel pixmaps (within Channels window). 0x0 disables this feature. pixcols = n number of columns the channel window should use. Defaults to 1.

mixer = ctl | device:ctl

This allows to control volume using the sound card mixer. ctl is the mixer control, i.e. "vol" for the master volume. "line1" is a good candidate for the TV card. device is the mixer device (defaults to /dev/mixer in unspecified). Volume-control works with the keypad: + is up, - is down, Enter is mute.

jpeg-quality = n

set the quality for jpeg images. As usual the valid range for n is [0

mjpeg-quality = n

set the quality for mjpeg AVI movies. Default is 50.

keypad-ntsc = on | off

Configure keypad mode. Default is off. When set to on, numbers typed on the keypad are interpreted as channel numbers (this is like NTSC TV sets work). Otherwise they are interpreted as programmed station, i.e. 1 is the first station from $HOME/.xawtv, ...

osd = on | off

Enable/disable the onscreen display in fullscreen mode. Default is on.

You can start other programs from within xawtv. This is configured with entries in the "[launch]" section:

label = key, command line

The specified hotkey will run the configured program. Calling the Action "Launch(label)" works too. If you want to play with the Xt translation tables, feel free to do so. But don't complain if you broke something while doing so...

config file example

My config file looks like this:

# this is a comment
# empty lines are ignored too
[global]
freqtab = pal-europe
#mixer   = line
fullscreen = 768x576
# for /etc/XF86Config
# Modeline  "pal"  50.00  768 832 856 1000  576 590 595 630  -hsync -vsync
[launch]
AleVT = Ctrl+A, alevt
[defaults]
source  = television
norm    = pal
[ZDF]
channel=33
key=F1
[ORB]
channel = 27
key = F2
# more stations follow here
[Camera]
source = Composite1
key = K