[comp.sys.atari.st] UniTerm 2.1a wishlist

poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole) (03/06/88)

mcvax!ukc!mupsy!liv-cs!sqrkl, Richard K. Lloyd writes >Wishlist for
the next release of UniTerm (2.1a ??) : Please write to me personally
about things like this, I can't promise an answer (I get a hell of a
lot of mail), but I will read it (not that I would normally answer a
letter with such an agressive undertone).  

>2) Double width, single height text on colour monitors.  

If you want to design 6 fonts, three in a 4x4 cell, and the other half
in a 4*2.5 (:-)) cell, your welcome.  Seriously, designing fonts is a
LOT of work and adding more fonts means the program gets larger
(besides I don't have a color monitor to try any color stuff out (not
that it would help, my ST is so old that it's got a GLUE chip that
won't drive a color set properly (not even the joystick port works)).

>3) Faster Tektronix mode.  

The vector
drawing is fast enough for 9600 baud, at least I've never had any
trouble with it. I relize the text mode is slow, but somewhere I have
to draw the line, or else I'll end up reimplenting the whole OS.  

>4) A one-key NO SCROLL key (none of this ALT-Z stuff) - I currently use 
>   INSERT to go in and out of the SLE...this acts as a useful NO SCROLL
>   key.  

If you hold down the <Alternate> key, you've essentially got a one key
NO SCROLL key, anyway in the more recent versions you can actually put
the no-scroll function on any of the programmable keys.

>5) Why does an alert dialog appear if you disable the SLE and then (accident- 
>   ally or deliberately) press the INSERT key ? This rather makes the 'dis- 
>   abling' aspect a bit useless...!  

No it doesn't, you obviously don't understand why it can be disabled...  

>6) Retain the screen display when switching from or to 132 column mode,
>   rather than clearing the screen and homing the cursor. 

Wrong! No VT1XX, VT2XX or VT3XX compatible terminal works this way,
all clear the screen and home the cursor. The command set of D*C
compatible terminals has no provision for dealing with mixed length
lines (I can think of all kind of perversions you would have to deal
with, if you want to have a terminal with this feature).  

>7) Follow this convention for mouse control : 
> If there is keyboard input or serial line activity, leave the mouse 
> switched off UNLESS the mouse is moved (switch it back on again in that 
> case). Use either the standard mouse arrow or an outlined char cell box 
> for the mouse because these are easier to use than the I-bar.  

Too late, it already works this way in the recent versions.  

> If the mouse button is clicked whilst the mouse is on, then the cursor 
> should move to the character cell nearest to the mouse pointer. BUT....  
> listen to the echo from the host after each cursor arrow code is sent - 
> then the cursor can be 'stopped' if it exceeds the selected position 
> (as is the case if there is tabs between the original cursor position and 
> the destination position selected by the mouse).  

And how do you suggest to do this? (It's not so simple as you think it
is...)  There are about as many different ways to postition the
cursor, as there are editors, the way it's implemented now, it works
ok with xedit and with edt (without tabs).


                              Simon Poole
                              Bitnet: K538915@CZHRZU1A
                              UUCP: ...mcvax!cernvax!forty2!poole

tim@brspyr1.BRS.Com (Tim Northrup) (03/08/88)

From article <186@forty2.UUCP>, by poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole):
> mcvax!ukc!mupsy!liv-cs!sqrkl, Richard K. Lloyd writes >Wishlist for

>>6) Retain the screen display when switching from or to 132 column mode,
>>   rather than clearing the screen and homing the cursor. 
> 
> Wrong! No VT1XX, VT2XX or VT3XX compatible terminal works this way,
> all clear the screen and home the cursor. The command set of D*C
> compatible terminals has no provision for dealing with mixed length
> lines (I can think of all kind of perversions you would have to deal
> with, if you want to have a terminal with this feature).  

Sorry Simon, but I use an HDS2200 (VT-220 compatible from Human Designed
Systems), that *does* retain the screen on size change.

Actually, it's an option in the setup menus.  When enabled, it does this:

	Change from 80 to 132 --> extra 52 columns get spaces

	Change from 132 to 80 --> lines get truncated at 80 (no wrap)

It seems to work just fine.  The software may not deal with it particularly
well (editors, etc), but that isn't the terminals problem, nor should it
be.

I kind of like the feature, but then again I don't switch screen size
all that often.
-- 
Tim "The Enchanter" Northrup
----------------------------				   "She's strange,
tim@brspyr1.BRS.Com  or  uunet!steinmetz!brspyr1!tim	    and I like it!"
====================================================		     -- Cameo

weaver@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Andrew Weaver) (03/09/88)

In article <2866@brspyr1.BRS.Com> tim@brspyr1.BRS.Com (Tim Northrup) writes:
>From article <186@forty2.UUCP>, by poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole):
>> mcvax!ukc!mupsy!liv-cs!sqrkl, Richard K. Lloyd writes >Wishlist for
>
>>>6) Retain the screen display when switching from or to 132 column mode,
>>>   rather than clearing the screen and homing the cursor. 
>> 
>> Wrong! No VT1XX, VT2XX or VT3XX compatible terminal works this way,
>> all clear the screen and home the cursor. The command set of D*C
[stuff deleted]
>Sorry Simon, but I use an HDS2200 (VT-220 compatible from Human Designed
>Systems), that *does* retain the screen on size change.
>
>
>I kind of like the feature, but then again I don't switch screen size
>all that often.
>-- 
>Tim "The Enchanter" Northrup

	This "change size without clear screen" feature is also
found on the Wyse wy85 terminal (and, I believe, another vt2xx clone
made bye some company called Draco I believe.)  True, it would be a nice
feature to have, but admittedly not one that I'd die without. :-)

	I have been following this discussion, and if there is one
thing that I'd like to see (maybe this is in 2.0, I only have 1.8 as of
yet, and am looking for an arpa/uucp/ftp archive for 2.0) is a small
editor, perhaps in a window, that would allow one to edit a small file
while still on-line (without leaving Uniterm.)  This is the only feature
of FLASH! that I haven't seen Uniterm sufficiently beat the hell out of.
(As far as I am concerned, I have never seen such a nice term package as,
Uniterm, commerical or otherwise, including Procomm for the PCs, a nice
program in its own right.)

	Thanks again for Simon for making the world, at least the world
of ST, a bit of a nicer place.

	
-- 
Andrew Weaver 				          weaver@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu
OSU College of Business				  soon:    weaver@osu-pisa.UUCP

"What's the watermelon do?"   "I'll tell you later."    -- from Buckaroo Banzai

davidli@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu (Dave Meile) (03/09/88)

In article <7934@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu> weaver@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Andrew Weaver) writes:
>thing that I'd like to see (maybe this is in 2.0, I only have 1.8 as of
>yet, and am looking for an arpa/uucp/ftp archive for 2.0) is a small
>editor, perhaps in a window, that would allow one to edit a small file
>while still on-line (without leaving Uniterm.)  This is the only feature

Actually, Uniterm 1.8 has that particular option (if memory serves).  You
can run your favorite text editor while still conected to a BBS, for example,
and then upload the file.  I've even used that particular feature to scan
through some ARC files for a piece of relevant information I want to
upload.  In the FILE menu is the option "Run Program".  It works quite
nicely ... although you will have to set up your buffer space so that you
have enough space to run a particular program.  On a 1040ST, a system
buffer size of 200K is not bad.

In 2.0 you can even set things up so that a single keypress (like F1, etc.)
automagically invokes your text editor this way.  The Macro capability in
Uniterm is becoming very, very useful.  You can even set up an equivalent
to the DO files of Flash...

-- an enthusiastic (keep it up Simon!) fan

hase@netmbx.UUCP (Hartmut Semken) (03/11/88)

In article <2866@brspyr1.BRS.Com> tim@brspyr1.BRS.Com (Tim Northrup) writes:
>From article <186@forty2.UUCP>, by poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole):
>> mcvax!ukc!mupsy!liv-cs!sqrkl, Richard K. Lloyd writes >Wishlist for
>
>>>6) Retain the screen display when switching from or to 132 column mode,
>>>   rather than clearing the screen and homing the cursor. 
>> 
>> Wrong! No VT1XX, VT2XX or VT3XX compatible terminal works this way,
>> all clear the screen and home the cursor. 


I'm using a Plessey VT220-kompatible Terminal that does the trick.

On switching to 132 colummns you get spaces to the right,
and on switching to 80 colummns the lines get truncated

hase
-- 
Hartmut Semken, Berlin (West) (*east of West-Germany :-)
hase@netmbx.UUCP
I think, you may be right in what I think you're thinking. (Douglas Adams)

poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole) (03/12/88)

rosenkra@alliant.UUCP (Bill Rosenkranz) writes 
>add to wish list:
(what about Concentrix supporting longer login names :-))  
>      1) make it work from gulaam (my copy of 2.x does not, or is it me?)     
>         works ok from desktop (old ROM, no blitter, 1040, HD)                
Must be you, are you starting it with the 'gem' command. 
>      2) ability to invoke arc or less (or any command for that matter)       
>         (maybe it does now...not being able to invoke from gulaam forced     
>         me back to v1.7b and i haven't really read new docs)                 
You can start any program from UniTerm (as long as it doesn't use to much
memory), caveat: some shells seem to confuse Malloc, which in turn messes
up memory allocation in UniTerm.

>      3) would be nice to see file size/dates in fsel dialog (i.e. replace    
>         fsel with something better)                                          
I would think this to be nice too, it's just that I don't want to subject
the users of UniTerm to Yet-Another-File-Selector and would rather wait for
Atari to provide a better one (if they would at least use the one in PC-GEM).
>otherwise i use uniterm almost exclusively on ST. it is really nice! all this
>from freeware...                                                     
Thanks!
BTW what about a deal: Alliant stops carrying out their feud with Apollo
(in which both companies don't make a very good impression) at our cost
and I send you the most recent UniTerm version (only half :-)).

(one guess to what forty2 is)
-- 
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UUCP:   ...mcvax!cernvax!forty2!poole			Simon Poole
BITNET: K538915@CZHRZU1A
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