What is proper keyboard method for in and out of terminal mode?

[yonnie]

Most places for commands suggest ctrl+Alt+F1 thru F6 and ctrl+Alt+F7 to get back to the GUI.  You also get a number 'ttyx' to tell you which terminal you're using.  I'm guessing these work the same as if you clicked on the terminal in the GUI mode.

ctrl+Alt+F7 does not seem to work for returning to GUI, but it does send you to some sort of text screen with no indications of how to save or work with text.  I don't remember the old emacs commands, perhaps those will work here?

ctrl+Alt+F8 returns you to the GUI.  crtl+Alt+F9 through F11 takes you to screens that seem to have no purpose.  F12 takes you to a screen presenting 'klog'.

[pags]

F7 was used, because it was "far enough away" from other TTYs, at the time (which used to go from F1 throught to F4).  It's never been "written in stone", so to speak, so I imagine the (newer) convention (it's not unique to PCLOS) of F8 was to "move it down, abit"...
F9 through F11 are not really blank, per se...they are more like "reserved"...if you do multiple GUIs (switch user, whatever you want to call it), each new session goes to the next available TTY (so, F(, then F10, etc.)

...yes, "klog" is the kernel's system messages...getting dumped somewhere out of the way, but still accessible.

 

[rastus]

I've always thought that the F7 session was for the system, and F8 is the current user session.

[yonnie]

Rastus,so F7 is for the root or SU?

pags, if I switch user's then F9 will give me a choice for other user?  Last time I switched user's too many times I got a 'kernel panic'.  Which BTW, I've not encountered in a very long time and don't know the proper way to recover from.  What would you suggest?

[pags]

Rastus,so F7 is for the root or SU?

pags, if I switch user's then F9 will give me a choice for other user?  Last time I switched user's too many times I got a 'kernel panic'.  Which BTW, I've not encountered in a very long time and don't know the proper way to recover from.  What would you suggest?

For switching, or recovering? 

Without a lot to go one, I could only guess that maybe you have a memory issue (depending on the DE, etc.)...you can use the software (DMs) functionality to switch, or the keyboard...should be the same thing.  Use what works for you.

As for recovering from a kernel panic...I'm guessing it usually too late at that point.  REISUB probably wouldn't work...power down, wait, power up.

[rastus]

Rastus,so F7 is for the root or SU?

Er, no. Not a root session. You can start a separate parallel root session with a graphical interface from the PC menu (PC > Leave > Switch User). I often do that if I have some sort of maintenance to carry out which requires root privileges to allow my user session to continue backing up, CD ripping or whatever in the background.

Now, I've always thought the F7 blank screen was reserved for system processes, but now I think about it some more I don't think that's right. 

I think that Suse used to have Alt-Ctl-F7 as the current user session, so possibly it's just how PCLOS is set up that assigns the F8 session to the current user, and as a consequence the F7 is unused and blank, in the same way F9 and F10 are blank until you start a session within them.

There's an explanation of keyboard commands for session management here which you might find useful:

http://go2linux.garron.me/start%20second%20X%20session%20xinit%20startx

[bicol_willem]

Have a look at yakuake for ease. You might love it.