RE: vt100 compliance

["Howard Chu" <chu@platinum.com>]

The situation is not as bad as you make it out to be. Just as
you can set a TERMCAP environment variable, you can also set
a TERMINFO variable. There's a slight difference, of course. With
TERMCAP, you could set it to either the pathname of a termcap-formatted
file, or you could set it to an actual entry. With TERMINFO, you must
set it to the pathname of a terminfo-style directory hierarchy.

My .login contains this line:
	if ($term == tw52) setenv TERMINFO ~/.terminfo

Here's my .terminfo directory:
troy:~% ls -lR .terminfo
total 24
drwxr-sr-x   2 hyc      staff        512 Aug 23 1996  a
drwxr-sr-x   2 hyc      staff        512 Jun 16 1995  s
drwxr-sr-x   2 hyc      staff        512 Apr  1 01:32 t

.terminfo/a:
total 8
-rw-r--r--   1 hyc      staff        909 Aug 23 1996  ansi

.terminfo/s:
total 8
-rw-r--r--   1 hyc      staff        714 Jun 16 1995  st52

.terminfo/t:
total 8
-rw-r--r--   1 hyc      staff        821 Apr  1 01:32 tw52
troy:~%

Read the terminfo man pages, they'll explain what's going on here but
the above listing should make it fairly obvious.

The only thing you need next is to either convert your termcap entry
into a terminfo entry, or write a terminfo entry from scratch, and
compile it. You can usually find "captoinfo" on terminfo systems, for
doing the conversion. Every terminfo system also includes "tic" the
TermInfoCompiler.

Just for curiosity's sake, here's my tw52 terminfo source, based on
the MINIWIN program... It's the one I use on AIX, which has a couple
function-key names that differ from standard SVR4 Unix, so you may
get warnings about unrecognized names if you use it on other systems.
Once again - read the terminfo man pages, they'll tell you what's
available. I also have some modifications that I use at home with
ncurses. (But I'm at the office right now, so they're not handy right
now...)


tw52|miniwin window mgr,
        am, eo, km, mir, msgr, xon,
        cols#80, it#8, lines#50, lm#100,
        bel=\007, bold=\EyA, civis=\Ef, clear=\EE, cnorm=\Ee\Et\s,
        cr=\r, cub1=\b, cud1=\EB, cuf1=\EC, cvis=\Ee\Et*,
        cup=\EY%p1%'\s'%+%c%p2%'\s'%+%c, cuu1=\EA, dch1=\Ea,
        dim=\EyB, dl1=\EM, ed=\EJ, el=\EK, home=\EH, ht=\t,
        il1=\EL, ind=\n, rc=\Ek, rev=\Ep, ri=\EI, rmir=\Ei,
        rmso=\Eq, rmul=\EzH, rs2=\Ez_, sc=\Ej, sgr0=\Ez_,
        smcup=\Eq\Ev\Ee, smir=\Eh, smso=\Ep, smul=\EyH,
        kf1=\EP, kf2=\EQ, kf3=\ER, kf4=\ES, kf5=\ET,
        kf6=\EU, kf7=\EV, kf8=\EW, kf9=\EX, kf10=\EY,
        khlp=\EH, kich1=\EI, khome=\EE, kquit=\EK,
        knp=\Eb, kpp=\Ea, kdch1=\177, kscl=\Ed, kscr=\Ec,
        kcud1=\EB, kcub1=\ED, kcuf1=\EC, kcuu1=\EA,
        skf1=\Ep, skf2=\Eq, skf3=\Er, skf4=\Es, skf5=\Et,
        skf6=\Eu, skf7=\Ev, skf8=\Ew, skf9=\Ex, skf10=\Ey,

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Martin-Eric Racine [mailto:q-funk@megacom.net]
> Sent: Friday, May 22, 1998 1:25 PM
> To: MiNT-List
> Subject: Re: vt100 compliance
>
>
>  >MR>Then again, I would appreciate the option of having true vt100 vcons
>  >MR>(with color support) and not be told that I "should start using MiNT
>  >
>  >Tell me which vt100 codes are not supported by tw100.
>  >
>  >Petr
>
> "echo $TERM" returns tw100, which most remote servers do not recognize,
> even after a proper termcap has been uploaded (shell parameters & all).
>
> MANY newer applications consider termcap as obsolete; they need a pre-
> compiled terminfo, which is NOT something the user can upload; it has
> to be installed by tech support.
>
> Usually, tech support won't give a flying hoot about that odd user who
> cannot simply use real vt100 like everyone else...
>
> It's not a question of how many vt100 or ANSI escape codes your tw100
> termcap defines;  it's a question of tw100 being a non-standard oddball
> term, and termcap becoming obsoleted by terminfo.
>
> If you don't agree, consult with Kris Lawson and have him quote you
> the manual pages from his system.  It took him ages to figure it out,
> until some manual specificaly said "termcap is obsoleted by terminfo".
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> From: Martin-Eric Racine FUNKYWARE http://www.megacom.net/~q-funk
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
>  Unsollicited material will be proof-read for $100 USD per word,
>  payable within 10 days.  Submission of your advertisement to my
>  address constitutes your formal acceptance of these terms.
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
>  <TITLE><BLINK><H1>No HTML Messages Please!</H1></BLINK></TITLE>
>