info-mac@uw-beaver (info-mac) (09/21/84)
From: (Dave Martin [stug]) dpm@lbl-csam > Could you give me a little more information about TEKALIKE? First, > can you use a screen editor when using TEKALIKE or are you forced to > switch back and forth between MACTERMINAL and TEKALIKE all the time? > (Editors I have in mind would be vi, fine, emacs, etc.) Second, what > scaling is done on the Tektronix plot? If the entire plot is reduced, > it must be a factor of 2 or 3 at least. Does this leave a readable > image (e.g., can labeling of axes be clearly read)? Second, is there > any zoom or magnify option so that a downloaded plot can be examined > in part at full size (similar to the way MACPAINT provides a window > to a larger area, which can be examined at leisure)? How fast is > the plot generation? Can multiple windows with different TEKALIKE > plots be viewed at once? Will you or others be in contact with > Mesa Research to suggest improvements? > I have been using a Visual 550 terminal at home. The beauty of > that machine is that it automatically switches over to Tektronix > mode upon reception of graphics data from the mainframe; pushing a > key switches back to alphanumeric mode. This would be an ideal goal > for the second-generation TEKALIKE to strive for. > You might want to send you answer to info-mac instead of to > me since this information would, I hope, interest many others. Thanks. > > Henry Greenside > > Unless you have a screen editor which does something intelligent with a Tektronix 4010, 4012, 4014 or 4016 terminal I'm afraid you're out of luck. (Anyone written any good storage tube screen editors lately?) I just grit my teeth and use the Software Tools editor... TEKALIKE has 3 page options: Full, TEKALIKE and MacPaint. I rarely use anything other than the TEKALIKE option, since it fills the entire screen save for an inch of right margin and is undistorted. The MacPaint option maps the plotting area into a rectangle the same size as the working area of MacPaint, which is rather small. All are legible if you avoid the 3 smallest character sizes in your text. (4 sizes plus the Mac's system font are supported.) You can select a rectangular region of the display and blow it up to fill the screen. No scrolling windows into larger reqions, though. Plot generation is satisfyingly fast, faster than many VT-100/TEK 401x emulating terminals I've tried. I don't know how much XON/XOFFing is going on at the higher baud rates, but I do recall 19.2KB being a noticeable improvement over 9600. (I'm working from memory here; most of my usage is from home at 1200 baud. Sigh.) Only a single "window" is available for plotting. No scroll bars or grow boxes... I plan to encourage the folks at Mesa Graphics to smooth out some of the rough edges of this release. The chap I spoke to there when I placed my phone order hinted that additional terminal emulations (i.e. VT100) are high on the list of requested enhancements. dpm