Inputrc deals with the mapping of the keyboard for certain situations. This file is the start-up file used by readline - the input related library used by Bash and most other shells. For more information see info bash -- Node: Readline Init file as well as info readline. There is a lot that can be done with this one rc file. Global values are set in /etc/inputrc. Personal user values are set in ~/.inputrc. The ~/.inputrc file will override the global settings file. A later page sets up Bash to use /etc/inputrc if there is no .inputrc for a user when /etc/profile is read (usually at login). If you want your system to use both, or don't want global keyboard handling, it is a good idea to place a default .inputrc into the /etc/skel directory for use with new users. Below is a base /etc/inputrc along with comments to explain what the various options do. Note that comments can not be on the same line as commands. If you will create an .inputrc in /etc/skel using the command below, change the command's output to /etc/skel/.inputrc and be sure to check/set permissions afterward. Then you can just copy that file to /etc/inputrc and the home directory of any user already existing in the system, including root, that needs a private version of the file. Be sure to use the -p parameter of cp to maintain permissions and be sure to change owner and group appropriately. cat > /etc/inputrc << "EOF" # Begin /etc/inputrc # Make sure we don't output everything on the 1 line set horizontal-scroll-mode Off # Enable 8bit input set meta-flag On set input-meta On # Turns off 8th bit stripping set convert-meta Off # Keep the 8th bit for display set output-meta On # none, visible or audible set bell-style none # All of the following map the escape sequence of the # value contained inside the 1st argument to the # readline specific functions "\eOd": backward-word "\eOc": forward-word # for linux console "\e[1~": beginning-of-line "\e[4~": end-of-line "\e[5~": beginning-of-history "\e[6~": end-of-history "\e[3~": delete-char "\e[2~": quoted-insert # for xterm "\eOH": beginning-of-line "\eOF": end-of-line # End /etc/inputrc EOF