Technology Tales

Changing monitor brightness using the Linux command line

11^th August 2018

Recently, I needed to reduce my monitor brightness but could not make the hardware buttons work. Thus, I considered alternatives and discovered the xrandr command was effective. First, I needed to identify my display name, so I executed the following command with the -q query switch to retrieve this information:

xrandr -q | grep " connected"

The output from this looked like this:

DVI-D-0 connected primary 1920x1080+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 521mm x 293mm

My device name appeared as the first block of characters in the above, so I plugged that into the second command below to achieve the desired adjustment.

xrandr --output DVI-D-0 --brightness 0.9

Any value between 0.0 and 1.0 is acceptable, but I went with 0.9 for 90% brightness. The required dimming and brightening then is only a command away.

A wider view

12^th July 2010

After playing with the idea for a while, I finally have succumbed to the charms of buying a new and bigger screen. While I questioned the wisdom of replacing a 17" screen that worked without fail, what is sitting in front of me as I write these words is a 24" Iiyama ProLite B2409HDS and very nice it is too. This is my third Iiyama and I stayed local when it came to acquiring the thing. Mind you, bringing back a 7.7 kg box by public transport takes its toll when trying to carry it using the handle on its top.

Once the thing was home, its installation was a straightforward matter of attaching the base, releasing the pin from the back to raise the screen higher and attaching it to a PC. The screen can be raised to a good height that stops slouching and should promote decent posture. Though there is a DVI socket on the back of the monitor, I am using the D-SUB connection because that is what is on the back of my main home PC, even if adding a graphics card would allow the use of the DVI option; that's something that will have to wait for now. What will continue to await use are the speakers that are included because I never used those on the old panel either, mostly because I have a set of standalone speakers for that job.

Out of curiosity, I attached the new screen to a running PC. However, I soon found that any adjustments to the resolution produced disturbing flickering on the screen, but these were banished by a system reboot. Then, I upped the resolution to the maximum of 1920x1080 and the result is more than workable with no discomfort. So far, I have put the extra display real estate to use for perusing digital maps and processing of digital photos. Limitations on the length of a line of on-screen text should be, for the sake of readability, mean that a larger screen is not so advantageous for web browsing. Considering those width restrictions, it might be time to move away from my habit of maximising application windows to fill the screen to have more of them open on the same desktop at once. While that's another option for exploring later, it's good to have them too.

Now, I have to think up a use for the old Iiyama ProLite E431S that has served so well over the last few years. Various thoughts like spreading a display over more than one screen or using it when I have two PC's going at once have come to into my head, but I'm not rushing anything. One thing that I don't intend to do is retiring the thing just yet. Things have moved on from CRT monitors that start to ail after a few years of use, with their LCD successors showing more resilience and cutting down on the cost of computing in the process. Seeing piles of CRT's awaiting dumping is a distressing sight that both can and should be consigned to history in these more environmentally aware days. Thoughts like that have the effect of curtailing any spending on gadgets for me and I have no intention of building up a collection of LCD panels, so what I have will need to do me for a good few years. On the evidence of the screens that I have been using, there's good reason to expect plenty of longevity and good service to follow.