[comp.sys.apollo] Can't find termcap file.

yman@fees.vut.edu.au (Y.M. NG) (06/12/91)

One of our 3500 suddenly developed a very strange problem. While login on the
console as non superuser, we cannot run program that need to know the terminal
information. If one login as root (or su) all is fine. 
I have checked the access permission on the termcap file and its content. In 
fact if one login from another machine by using telnet and set TERM to 
apollo_1280_bw, the application behave normally.

Any help or pointer as to how this can be fixed (short of invol and reload the OS)
will be greately appreciately. Thank you in advance.

$ set
DISPLAY=:0
HOME=/user/ee_staff/yman
IFS= 	

ISP=m68k
...              (deleted)
SHELL=/bin/sh
SYSTYPE=bsd4.3
TERM=apollo_1280_bw
TZ=EDT-10
TZNAME=EDT
USER=yman

$ elm
Failed trying to initialize your terminal entry: unknown return code -3
$ rn
No termcap file found.    
$ vt100
Cannot create vt100 window
$ vi abc
apollo_1280_bw: Unknown terminal type
[Using open mode]
"abc" [New file] 

$ set
DISPLAY=:0
HOME=/user/ee_staff/yman
IFS= 	

ISP=m68k
...
SHELL=/bin/sh
SYSTYPE=bsd4.3
TERM=apollo_1280_bw
TZ=EDT-10
TZNAME=EDT
USER=yman

$ pwd
//fees/etc/bsd4.3
$ ls -l termcap
-rw-r--r--   1 root       130943 Aug 16  1989 termcap
-- 
Yauman NG                               E-mail: yman@fees.vut.edu.au
Dept of Electrical Engineering, FIT     Tel: (03) 688-4724
Victoria University of Technology,      Australia  3011