JRD@CC.USU.EDU (Joe Doupnik) (01/20/91)
Keith (and Richard), Yes, MS-DOS Kermit does write directly to the display hardware when insert / delete character commands arrive, but it does so in a DESQview-aware manner (even beyond what the DV specs call for). MSK has known about virtual screen buffers before DV was written and it tells the screen manager about all changes (DV says don't bother telling). I think the problem mentioned has a lot more to do with DV than with Kermit. That is, if an application is run without virtual screen support then DV doesn't bother (apparently) keeping the screen clean; nothing much I can do about that. Windows also used virtual screens prior to Windows 3 and MSK works with that system too (and requires special steps to placate certain personality items in the older Windows, but it's all transparent to the user). A while back I tried an experiment of not going to the hardware for ins/del chars and the resulting slowness was too much for people to tolerate. Thus, we are where we are today on this item. Btw, I have not seen a copy of your msg via Columbia. Since I'm in the process of final cleanups and freezing of this version (3.02) of Kermit the msg is timed just right. Joe D.