blinking messages to /etc/issue

[RK_7]

Can I add some blinking messages to /etc/issue?
If so how?

Thanks and Regards

[Peter Godron · Accepted solution]

Hi,
this greatly depends what terminal software you are using.

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=32741

do a man tput for additional info

[RAC_1]

you can't do that directly, but you can with some code in /etc/profile. code like following will do that.

tput blink
echo "this, that"
tput rmso blink

[Bill Hassell]

/etc/issue is the only pre-login message that is sent to the user that is starting to login. There are hindreds of terminal models as well as dozens of terminal emulators and they use different codes to signal character enhancements such as blink, inverse, underline, etc. Since there is no way to determine what type of terminal is starting to connect, hardcoding an escape sequence in /etc/issue will cause strange characters to appear on some screens.

After a successful login, the terminal type will be set and then the tput commands will work to provide blinking, underlining, etc.

Usually, such a requirement is due to security requirements, but since blinking (or other stand-out enhancements) is always dependent on the device used to see the text (PDAs, laptops, Macs, mainframes, etc) you can never be sure it will work right. And that defeats the purpose of the stand-out. So instead, make the text unique. Use a box around the text, add extra blank lines and use a large portion of the screen. Note that some screens may not display correctly if test is in the last column so keep the text to 70 characters per line for compatibility.