Are you using Debian for Arm through QEmu? If so, and you want to use it in text mode (useful, for example, to use it outside a graphical window), the key is the special terminal ttyAMA0.

You must configure your debian to put a getty on ttyAMA0, so you can log in it, and to send boot messages to that terminal too.

First, enter in the virtual machine, and edit /etc/inittab and add the following line

T0:23:respawn:/sbin/getty -L ttyAMA0 9600 vt100

Next time you boot on machine, a ttyAMA0 terminal will be spawn.

Finally, add to -append options the option “console=ttyAMA0”, so all boot messages will be sent to ttyAMA0.

Now, you can start qemu-system-arm with -nographic option work in text mode. If you want to login as root, add the ttyAMA0 to the /etc/securetty list.

And the final tip! You can exit from qemu with “Ctrl+A X” (don’t forget to power-off first your virtual machine).