[comp.unix.ultrix] stuck xterm

emv@math.lsa.umich.edu (Edward Vielmetti) (08/08/90)

ultrix 4.0, decstation 5000.  decwindows window manager, and an xterm
window the entire height of the screen and 1/2 the screen wide.

the xterm was started from a decterm window (xterm &).

when I cat a long file (50K) to that window, the scrolling is choppy,
but no more that I would expect.  but: when I cat that same file through
a simple perl filter (i.e. slightly slower display) the xterm scrolling
sometimes gets stuck.  The window freezes.  Control-left doesn't
bring up a menu, ps shows "idle", everything is gone.  Somewhere like
a minute or two later (after I hit some buttons) the window comes
back and all is well again.

I've had it happen with two different xterms, using exactly the same
test.  Not sure how many times it's happened before or whether I could
repeat it tomorrow.

Is there any way to get a trace of what's happening in a currently running
Ultrix process (like the AT&T "truss" or the SunOS "trace" ?)  Sure
would be nice right now.

--Ed

Edward Vielmetti, U of Michigan math dept <emv@math.lsa.umich.edu>
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obg@sics.se (Olof Backing) (08/08/90)

emv@math.lsa.umich.edu (Edward Vielmetti) writes:


>ultrix 4.0, decstation 5000.  decwindows window manager, and an xterm
>window the entire height of the screen and 1/2 the screen wide.

>the xterm was started from a decterm window (xterm &).

>when I cat a long file (50K) to that window, the scrolling is choppy,
>but no more that I would expect.  but: when I cat that same file through
>a simple perl filter (i.e. slightly slower display) the xterm scrolling
>sometimes gets stuck.  The window freezes.  Control-left doesn't
>bring up a menu, ps shows "idle", everything is gone.  Somewhere like
>a minute or two later (after I hit some buttons) the window comes
>back and all is well again.

>I've had it happen with two different xterms, using exactly the same
>test.  Not sure how many times it's happened before or whether I could
>repeat it tomorrow.

>Is there any way to get a trace of what's happening in a currently running
>Ultrix process (like the AT&T "truss" or the SunOS "trace" ?)  Sure
>would be nice right now.

How 'bout using a REAL window-system like X11 instead of DECWindows....

>--Ed

>Edward Vielmetti, U of Michigan math dept <emv@math.lsa.umich.edu>
>comp.text.sgml	ISO 8879 SGML, structured documents, markup languages
>			yes votes to sgml-yes@math.lsa.umich.edu
>			 no votes to  sgml-no@math.lsa.umich.edu
WHOAMI: Olof Backing                                  EMAIL:
WHERE:  Swedish Institute of Computer Science (SICS)  obg@sics.se
SNAIL:  Professorsslingan 25/102, S-104 05 Stockholm, Sweden
VOICE:  + 46 8 166318

joel@decwrl.dec.com (Joel McCormack) (08/08/90)

Pre-X11R4 xterms had a bug in which lots of output to the window would
freeze it.  You can fix this by iconifying and deiconifying the window. 
I still use this xterm because the post-R4 xterm has its own set of problems.

- Joel McCormack (decwrl!joel, joel@decwrl.dec.com)