jonathan@eleazar.Dartmouth.EDU (Jonathan Altman) (02/21/88)
Well, I got several requests to summarize my results, and quite a few responses to my requests on finding such a beast. The result of my search is that a sample terminal emulator stack exists, along with a group of XCMD/XFCN's that do serial port manipulation, and even the source files. The whole package is on an Apple release disk containing stacks and sources for some sample XCMD/XFCN's. Unfortunately, I do not have the exact name of the disk (this is the one item of stupidity I feel in this whole request: the contents of the disk were located on an Appleshare volume in an assosciate's office! Nonetheless, without pointers of what to ask for, I would not have found it). The whole package is available from Apple. I was told to ask a local Apple Rep. It is also available on several bulletin boards. As an aid in finding it, the disk also contained SoundCapMover, and the Sounds stack. As a last resort, I believe the stack is free, and I might be able to send it to people who needed it. The package contains 10 XCMD/XFCN's and two stacks demonstrating their use(called HyperTerm and SendSerial), all written by Harry Chesley. I have spent about two days designing my front end to work by modifying HyperTerm. The results are mixed: hypercard can be used as a front end to a terminal emulator package, but HyperTerm is very slow. I was working on a 9600 baud connection (at 9600, according to both the mac and the UNIX box at the other end), and it was slower than a modem at 1200 baud with displaying characters on the screen. In my rough look over the sources, I think there may be ways to speed this up, but that is in the twilight zone of my region of knowledge. As for creating these custom front-ends, some people requested info on packages for doing other things, such as CMS sessions with an IBM host. I was informed by someone at our computer center that a corporation is working on doing exactly this kind of thing: creating stacks that were customized to work as a terminal to various mainframe applications. As an example, on a UNIX host with vi and rn installed, you could have a stack with one card containing buttons, fields, etc. which would put a graphic interface onto vi, and another card which would put a graphic interface onto rn. I don't have any of the specifics on the products of this company, or even its name, or even any idea of EXACTLY what their stacks can do. I would be glad to find out if anybody wants (please e-mail those requests directly to me, I will answer). Lastly, I would like to thank those of you who responded to my request. This was my first post, and it was heartening to receive as many responses as I did. Jonathan Altman jonathan@eleazar.Dartmouth.edu Database Administrator (ihnp4,decvax)!dartvax!eleazar!jonathan Dartmouth Dante Project jonathan@eleazar.UUCP (I think) HB 6087 voice: 603-646-2633 Hanover, NH 03755 --- Disclaimer: The opinions stated in this message do not reflect those of Dartmouth College, and I have no connection with the firms mentioned, other than having been told of the existence of their products.