{SOLVED by using gm10s directions+}using TERMINAL to enable external monitor in clone mode

[CapnGimp]

I have mint 19 installed on my laptop. Knocked it off the shelf to the ground yesterday with the wheelchair handles protruding from the back of theseat and broke the screen. It is unreadable. I plugged an external monitor into it but is is in extend mode, ie it has no icons nor MENU. I have searched everywhere for a command line to change it to clone mode so I can use my laptop. Fortunately I can right click and get a terminal but NO command I input is the answer. Can someone please help me.

[gm10]

If you allow me to interpret your request a little, it seems to me what you really want is to disable the internal screen and use the external instead, right?

Two ways. Either you start the GUI tool to switch displays via the terminal or the menu and move it over to the good screen (Alt+F7) to enter move mode and configure it there, or you run

Code: Select all

xrandr

to get the names of your outputs and then you set your external screen as primary and turn the internal screen off:

Code: Select all

xrandr --output HDMI-1 --primary --auto
xrandr --output eDP-1 --off

Substitute HDMI-1 and eDP-1 by your own output names should they differ.

[CapnGimp]

Thank you very much!
LVDS-1 was laptop display and VGA-1 was external monitor
input just as you said and after enter on second one, they switched/lap-off vga has menu/icons
laptop display came back on as i was typing lol

[CapnGimp]

I just copied and pasted my previous entries and it went back to ext monitor being primary/having menu....so I quickly went to menu/preferences/displays and set it up correctly and hit system wide. I have yet to reboot it but am going to get off my porch where I have this bad laptop with attached external monitor plugged in....It's 108 degrees Fahrenheit here, and get my older dell and sit on my lounger in the shade of my storage container and surf the rest of today away on solar power, here in the desert. BTW I used alt+7 to 'grab' the window and move it to the vga by mouse....did not know that trick, was just trying it because it did not fit anywhere else in your instructions Thanks again!