[comp.emacs] Recommendations for terminal with Meta key?

rsm@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu (Robert Maier) (07/14/88)

I plan on buying a new terminal for personal use.  Since I use Emacs a
good bit, a Meta key is high on my list of requirements.  An escape
key, even a reasonably placed one, is a poor substitute.

Grepping for the `km' attribute (i.e., Meta key) in the Berkeley
termcap file turns up only the following:

	Mu|sun|Sun Microsystems Workstation console:
	SD|supdup|SUPDUP virtual terminal:
	MX|dmchat|dmchat version of datamedia 2500:
	hz|2392|hp2392|hp2392a:
	y7|t10|teleray 10 special:

Are the last three really the only choices I have?  Does anyone have
any other recommendations?

To be effective a Meta key should be as close to the Shift key as the
Control key is.  Switching from Control-v to Meta-v should be
painless...

======================================================================
Robert S. Maier   | Internet: rsm@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu
Dept. of Math.    | UUCP: ..{allegra,cmcl2,hao!noao}!arizona!amethyst!rsm
Univ. of Arizona  | Bitnet: maier@arizrvax
Tucson, AZ  85721 | Phone: +1 602 621 6893  /  +1 602 621 2617

flash@ee.qmc.ac.uk (Flash Sheridan) (07/18/88)

The Macintosh end of uw (Unix Windows) has an option to make the option key
a meta-key.  I haven't gotten it to work (with Jove 4.9), but haven't tried
too hard.  uw should run on a 128K Mac, which you should be able to get used
real cheap.

uw was posted to sources.unix awhile ago and is insanely great and free. Its
ansi mode seems not to clear too well, though (I re-bind ^L to clear and
redraw, and have to use it alot.)

From: flash@ee.qmc.ac.uk (Flash Sheridan)
Reply-To: sheridan@nss.cs.ucl.ac.uk
or_perhaps_Reply_to: flash@cs.qmc.ac.uk

bob@allosaur.cis.ohio-state.edu (Bob Sutterfield) (07/19/88)

In article <784@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu> rsm@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu (Robert Maier) writes:
>I plan on buying a new terminal for personal use.  Since I use Emacs
>a good bit, a Meta key is high on my list of requirements.  An escape
>key, even a reasonably placed one, is a poor substitute.

Don't buy a terminal - buy something that will do terminal emulation
as a sideline, as well as a bunch of other stuff.  But be sure that
whatever you buy runs software can do very, very good terminal
emulation.  Then, you can be better off, even for terminal emulation,
than if you bought single-function, special-purpose hardware.

I use "uw" on my Mac at home when talking to the UNIX machines at
work, which gives me up to seven windows.  It almost makes a 1200bps
modem tolerable, and 19200 is plenty nice at the office when my Sun is
down.

Anyway, uw offers a Meta key, bound to the Option key on the Macintosh
keyboard.  It can be configured to either emit the true eight-bit
character, or prepend an escape character before sending the character
for whatever key you've chorded with it.

>To be effective a Meta key should be as close to the Shift key as the
>Control key is.  Switching from Control-v to Meta-v should be
>painless...

The Option key is located (on a Classic Mac or Mac Plus keyboard,
anyway) between the Clover key (control) and the Shift key, on the
lower-left side of the main keypad.
-=-
 Bob Sutterfield, Department of Computer and Information Science
 The Ohio State University; 2036 Neil Ave. Columbus OH USA 43210-1277
 bob@cis.ohio-state.edu or ...!{att,pyramid,killer}!cis.ohio-state.edu!bob

admin@cs.ex.ac.uk (System Administrator) (07/22/88)

In article <784@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu> rsm@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu (Robert Maier) writes:
>I plan on buying a new terminal for personal use.  Since I use Emacs a
>good bit, a Meta key is high on my list of requirements.  An escape
	:
	:
>Are the last three really the only choices I have?  Does anyone have
>any other recommendations?

We use the Wyse 85 emulating vt100 and are very pleased with it.  The
Meta key  (or <Compose Char>), <SHIFT> and <CTRL> keys are close to
each other.  The <ESC> is at an awkward place but with the meta key
the <ESC> is rarely needed.

michael@pbinfo.uucp (Michael Schmidt) (07/22/88)

In article <784@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu>, rsm@amethyst (Robert Maier) writes:
>I plan on buying a new terminal for personal use.  Since I use Emacs a
>good bit, a Meta key is high on my list of requirements.  An escape
>key, even a reasonably placed one, is a poor substitute.

Surprisingly an Atari ST does the job! Buy one,  get Uniterm 2.0d
and you have all these fancy thingies like ^S,^Q  and meta key in
conjunction with an  vt200 emulation. Don't  know why this works,
but it works fine. I am using it at the moment.
-- 
    Michael Schmidt, Universitaet-GH Paderborn, FB 17, Warburger Str.100,
                     D-4790 Paderborn, West Germany
Mail:   michael@pbinfo.UUCP         or          michael%pbinfo@uunet.uu.net

flash@ee.qmc.ac.uk (Flash Sheridan) (07/25/88)

In article <18123@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu> bob@allosaur.cis.ohio-state.edu (Bob Sutterfield) writes:
>In article <784@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu> rsm@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu (Robert Maier) writes:
>
>Anyway, uw offers a Meta key, bound to the Option key on the Macintosh
>keyboard. 

The meta key works only on the old Macs, not on the Plus or SE.  Other than
that, uw is wonderful on any of them.

From: flash@ee.qmc.ac.uk (Flash Sheridan)
Reply-To: sheridan@nss.cs.ucl.ac.uk
or_perhaps_Reply_to: flash@cs.qmc.ac.uk

cjh@hpausla.HP.COM (Clifford Heath) (07/26/88)

>	hz|2392|hp2392|hp2392a:

The "Extend char" key on this isn't a true eighth bit setter; it just
changes the meaning of most of the keyboard so it creates characters in
the ROMAN8 character set, which is an 8 bit set.  So, M-c is not hex E4,
but rather B5, which is lower-case c cedille (cedille is an accent sort
of like a small upside down question mark below the letter that the
French use sometimes under the letter C) in the ROMAN8 character set.
It is possible to generate most of the Meta characters needed for
Gnuemacs, but you'll need a special set of mappings.

Some of the keys form a prefix for the next character, e.g. Extend char u
followed by a vowel sends the ROMAN8 code for the vowel with an umlaut
(two dots above the character), so for example M-u doesn't do anything
usable by itself.

This was typed on an HP2392A.

Clifford Heath, Hewlett Packard Australian Software Operation.
(UUCP: hplabs!hpfcla!hpausla!cjh, ACSnet: cjh@hpausla.oz)

rbj@nav.icst.nbs.GOV (Root Boy Jim) (07/27/88)

? I understand the limitation of the SE & II, since they're ADB keyboards...

Yeah, me too. I'd rather use a DBX or a GDB keyboard :-)

	(Root Boy) Jim Cottrell	<rbj@icst-cmr.arpa>
	National Bureau of Standards
	Flamer's Hotline: (301) 975-5688
	The opinions expressed are solely my own
	and do not reflect NBS policy or agreement
	Careful with that VAX Eugene!
	..  My vaseline is RUNNING...

Ralph.Hyre@IUS3.IUS.CS.CMU.EDU (07/28/88)

Remember: in UNIX, Case is Significant.
I would have said 'adb' if I meant 'adb', 
not ADB (which is Apple Desktop Bus;-)

julian@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Julian Cowley) (07/29/88)

In article <784@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu> rsm@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu (Robert Maier) writes:
>I plan on buying a new terminal for personal use.  Since I use Emacs a
>good bit, a Meta key is high on my list of requirements.  An escape
>key, even a reasonably placed one, is a poor substitute.
>
>Grepping for the `km' attribute (i.e., Meta key) in the Berkeley
>termcap file turns up only the following:
>
>	Mu|sun|Sun Microsystems Workstation console:
>	SD|supdup|SUPDUP virtual terminal:
>	MX|dmchat|dmchat version of datamedia 2500:
>	hz|2392|hp2392|hp2392a:
>	y7|t10|teleray 10 special:

Also try looking for the `MT' attribute.  This is another flag
for the meta key which I found by looking in the Emacs term.c
file.  I haven't seen it documented anywhere else but it does
turn up several entries in the /etc/termcap file.  On my system
(BSD), this is what I get:

	vs|xterm|vs100|xterm terminal emulator (X window system)
	D3|dm3025|datamedia 3025a:
	hz|2392|hp2392|hp2392a:      <-- repeat of above

So there you have two more choices to look at.

In the meantime, here is a source file for PC-Kermit that will
simulate a Meta key on an IBM PC standard keyboard.  Kermit is
the only comm program for IBMs I have found so far that actually lets
you customize the keyboard.  On top of that, Kermit is free.
To use this, you will need to have at least version 2.30, which
you should be able to find on your local host or on a local
bulletin board.  The previous versions of Kermit use a different
syntax for setting the scan codes.  If you are ambitious enough,
you could probably write a small program that could convert from
the new syntax to the old.

The original idea for this was some take files posted by Martin Neitzel
about a year ago.  They were written for an older version of Kermit, 
so the set commands were a bit different.  Also, they were set up to 
send two characters (ESC xx), which is not really emulating a true 
meta key.

Unfortunately, in the new versions of Kermit, they decided to
ignore certain scan codes (don't ask me why), so some of the more
important keys don't work.  These are any key combinations with
the following characters:

  [ ] { } ; : ' " ` ~ , . < > / ? \ | SPC DEL

M-ESC doesn't work, either.  To get around this, you'll just have
to use the old ESC key method.  You could probably set up the function
keys to fill in the gaps, but I didn't do this because I felt the
mapping should be a personal preference.

Don't forget to turn on the meta flag within Emacs, otherwise it
will just treat a meta key as a normal one.  You can turn on 
the meta flag permanently by putting the following in your .emacs file:

  (setq meta-flag t)

or by putting a :km attribute in the local TERMCAP entry for the 
terminal that you use.

While this is still not a complete Meta key emulation, it's better 
than nothing!  I'd still like to find out some answers to the original 
question about which terminals have a true Meta key.  Perhaps 
it would be a good idea for the FSF to distribute a list of 
terminals that have Meta keys in the etc/TERMS file.

Enjoy!

#! /bin/sh
# This is a shell archive.  Remove anything before this line, then unpack
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X; Emacs meta key simulation for PC-Kermit ver. 2.30 and greater
X;
X; Note that some key scan codes are ignored by Kermit, therefore
X; you will still have to use the ESC key.  These are key
X; combinations with any of the following keys:
X;
X;   [ ] { } ; : ' " , . < > / ? \ | ` ~ SPC DEL
X;
X; Written by Julian Cowley (julian@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu), 7/28/88
X;
Xset key \3961 \128	; M-C-@ or M-C-SPC
Xset key \3358 \129	; M-C-a
Xset key \3376 \130	; M-C-b
Xset key \3374 \131	; M-C-c
Xset key \3360 \132	; M-C-d
Xset key \3346 \133	; M-C-e
Xset key \3361 \134	; M-C-f
Xset key \3362 \135	; M-C-g
Xset key \3363 \136	; M-C-h
Xset key \3351 \137	; M-C-i or M-C-TAB
Xset key \3364 \138	; M-C-j or M-C-LFD
Xset key \3365 \139	; M-C-k
Xset key \3366 \140	; M-C-l
Xset key \3378 \141	; M-C-m	or M-C-RET
Xset key \3377 \142	; M-C-n
Xset key \3352 \143	; M-C-o
Xset key \3353 \144	; M-C-p
Xset key \3344 \145	; M-C-q
Xset key \3347 \146	; M-C-r
Xset key \3359 \147	; M-C-s
Xset key \3348 \148	; M-C-t
Xset key \3350 \149	; M-C-u
Xset key \3375 \150	; M-C-v
Xset key \3345 \151	; M-C-w
Xset key \3373 \152	; M-C-x
Xset key \3349 \153	; M-C-y
Xset key \3372 \154	; M-C-z
X			; M-C-[ or M-ESC
X			; M-C-\
X			; M-C-]
Xset key \3965 \158	; M-C-^
Xset key \3970 \159	; M-C-_
X			; M-SPC
Xset key \2936 \161	; M-!
X			; M-"
Xset key \2938 \163	; M-#
Xset key \2939 \164	; M-$
Xset key \2940 \165	; M-%
Xset key \2942 \166	; M-&
X			; M-'
Xset key \2944 \168	; M-(
Xset key \2945 \169	; M-)
Xset key \2943 \170	; M-*
Xset key \2947 \171	; M-+
X			; M-,
Xset key \2434 \173	; M--
X			; M-.
X			; M-/
Xset key \2433 \176	; M-0
Xset key \2424 \177	; M-1
Xset key \2425 \178	; M-2
Xset key \2426 \179	; M-3
Xset key \2427 \180	; M-4
Xset key \2428 \181	; M-5
Xset key \2429 \182	; M-6
Xset key \2430 \183	; M-7
Xset key \2431 \184	; M-8
Xset key \2432 \185	; M-9
X			; M-:
X			; M-;
X			; M-<
Xset key \2435 \189	; M-=
X			; M->
X			; M-?
Xset key \2937 \192	; M-@
Xset key \2846 \193	; M-A
Xset key \2864 \194	; M-B
Xset key \2862 \195	; M-C
Xset key \2848 \196	; M-D
Xset key \2834 \197	; M-E
Xset key \2849 \198	; M-F
Xset key \2850 \199	; M-G
Xset key \2851 \200	; M-H
Xset key \2839 \201	; M-I
Xset key \2852 \202	; M-J
Xset key \2853 \203	; M-K
Xset key \2854 \204	; M-L
Xset key \2866 \205	; M-M
Xset key \2865 \206	; M-N
Xset key \2840 \207	; M-O
Xset key \2841 \208	; M-P
Xset key \2832 \209	; M-Q
Xset key \2835 \210	; M-R
Xset key \2847 \211	; M-S
Xset key \2836 \212	; M-T
Xset key \2838 \213	; M-U
Xset key \2863 \214	; M-V
Xset key \2833 \215	; M-W
Xset key \2861 \216	; M-X
Xset key \2837 \217	; M-Y
Xset key \2860 \218	; M-Z
X			; M-[
X			; M-\
X			; M-]
Xset key \2941 \222	; M-^
Xset key \2946 \223	; M-_
X			; M-`
Xset key \2334 \225	; M-a
Xset key \2352 \226	; M-b
Xset key \2350 \227	; M-c
Xset key \2336 \228	; M-d
Xset key \2322 \229	; M-e
Xset key \2337 \230	; M-f
Xset key \2338 \231	; M-g
Xset key \2339 \232	; M-h
Xset key \2327 \233	; M-i
Xset key \2340 \234	; M-j
Xset key \2341 \235	; M-k
Xset key \2342 \236	; M-l
Xset key \2354 \237	; M-m
Xset key \2353 \238	; M-n
Xset key \2328 \239	; M-o
Xset key \2329 \240	; M-p
Xset key \2320 \241	; M-q
Xset key \2323 \242	; M-r
Xset key \2335 \243	; M-s
Xset key \2324 \244	; M-t
Xset key \2326 \245	; M-u
Xset key \2351 \246	; M-v
Xset key \2321 \247	; M-w
Xset key \2349 \248	; M-x
Xset key \2325 \249	; M-y
Xset key \2348 \250	; M-z
X			; M-{
X			; M-|
X			; M-}
X			; M-~
X			; M-DEL
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Julian Cowley, U. of Hawaii at Manoa
julian@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu
{uunet,ucbvax}!ucsd!nosc!uhccux!julian
julian@uhccux.bitnet

LUJWR@VAX1.CC.LEHIGH.EDU ("Joel W. Robertson, x83985") (08/01/88)

I use a Mac SE and a Mac II with MacKermit 0.9(36) which allows the
eighth bit to be prefixed automatically when the option key is
pressed.  It should also work (I think I configured it for a friend)
on a Mac Plus, Fat Mac, 128K Mac, etc.


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