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000205_news@newsmaster….columbia.edu _Sat Oct 24 08:04:30 1998.msg
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From: jrd@cc.usu.edu (Joe Doupnik)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.kermit.misc
Subject: Re: Stop automatic resetting of terminal emulation?
Message-ID: <$wFIGEPQCCWK@cc.usu.edu>
Date: 23 Oct 98 21:06:06 MDT
References: <Pine.WNT.4.05.9810220906420.169-100000@neko.dental.washington.edu> <zr359kB7TU8S@cc.usu.edu> <70ofhk$e9d$1@apakabar.cc.columbia.edu> <wegLF5YIzlTM@cc.usu.edu> <70q1jp$426$1@apakabar.cc.columbia.edu> <Pine.WNT.4.05.9810231439280.158-100000@neko.dental.washington.edu>
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Xref: news.columbia.edu comp.protocols.kermit.misc:9400
In article <Pine.WNT.4.05.9810231439280.158-100000@neko.dental.washington.edu>, Andrew J Pardoe <ap@u.washington.edu> writes:
> I read with great interest the followups to my original problem. As the
> followups were from three persons who are intimately involved with the
> development of Kermit, let me throw back in a lowly enduser's perspective.
<omissions>
> However, I expect that whenever a piece of software offers an unexpected
> or extraordinary feature that the software provide a method to turn off
> that feature. When I searched through my manuals I was looking for a
> command similar to "SET TERMINAL TYPE AUTONEGOTIATION OFF".
>
> Hint.
>
> Thank you three gentlemen, anyway, for the without question the most
> valuable software on the market today. It is a pleasure to use.
---------
To continue the thread just a little more. You are correct
that a manual override or control of some kind would be a good idea.
Implementing it may be a headscratcher for us keypushers, but we will see.
The problem again is the Telnet proper part of things is only a
part of things. On most remote hosts it tries to tell, not listen but
tell, the host what kind of terminal Telnet has negotiated. Tough luck
if the host o/s never heard of that kind. On the client side the emulator
may or may not be predetermined for a given terminal kind and won't work
as expected if Telnet forces another kind.
Here we see Telnet lives in a world of its own, without essential
feedback from the remote host o/s, nor from the client side, making its
own treaties with the opposite Telnet. That is really stupid, no two ways
about it. I do not appologize for being blunt here because the matter has
ticked me off. To be fair I am also in the "vendor camp" and should have
decoded all this years ago and done better then.
Telnet can negotiate aliases, a list of names which function
identically, if we let it and write code to confine it to just that list.
Telnet could have negotiated with the host software (on either end) to see
if an offered name or maybe something totally new were acceptable, but it
does not. Some folks call this a loose cannon.
The real solution to the Telnet Terminal Type Option is to avoid
it entirely. Telnet has not a clue on the matter. Instead, what "ought"
to occur is let the terminal emulator and remote host o/s battle it out
according to the terminal specs and whatever clever Plug&Play software
resides on that remote host. The word ought is in quotes because some
terminals support an ident query, some don't, some operating systems
know how to ask about a variety of terminals, others don't. But many do
and the most popular terminal kinds support an ident query; we ought to
let them have a go at it (my VMS SET TERM/INQUIRE in the login script)
and not keep Telnet TTYPE out of the act.
As Frank notes, and most experienced terminal emulation writers
know, terminal names on today's operating systems are whimsical in
spelling and not getting more disciplined. What might be known as "vt100"
on one is unacceptable on another yet "VT100" is, as a simple example.
Big sigh goes here. The situation is so muddled that algorithms (upper
then lower case, etc) can help only to a degree. The most sophisticated
chooser happens to be us, which is fine for the technically minded but
a pain for others.
In this I have taken the human side of the puzzle, the exasperation
experienced when the ground shifts with little to no notice, and have taken
apart the technical mechanism (Telnet TTYPE Option) that causes it. Jeff
is trying hard to make the mechanism work as well as possible, and if one
chooses to play that game then he is doing his best. Two different approaches;
neither is perfect. Upon reflection I think the game is silly, and there
is the end-to-end approach that needs careful consideration. Even then
we are not home free on the matter.
Joe D.