Serial Version Limitations

Serial Homer has several limitations.  Homer is one of the very few Mac Internet services to provide a serial version, and believe me, now  I understand why.

  1.  Serial Homer will not work with AV Macintoshes which use a Geoport.  The Geoport communicates using the Communications Toolbox, which Homer currently does not support.  I'm working on a rewrite of Homer in C++ which does, but don't hold your breath.

  2.  You can only connect from within UNIX accounts (not VMS or CMS or whatever), and your unix account must be capable of telnetting to remote machines (almost all accounts can; netcom.com is a notable exception).

  3.  This version of Serial Homer utilizes a feature of telnet which suppresses echoing.  I've found that some versions of telnet don't abide by this protocol, the result being that your Homer sessions will repeat everything you say, and generally won't work right.  Most versions of telnet seem to cooperate, however.  jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu is an example of a machine that doesn't play nice with serial Homer.

Serial Version Instructions

To run serial Homer, you need:

1.  A modem or some sort of serial line
2.  A unix account

To run it, do the following:

1.  Boot the program, check out the incredible About... box, then select the  appropriate options for the Communications Options dialog box.   This dialog is found in the Connection menu.
    
2.  The "Dumb Terminal" window on your screen is a dumb terminal.  Use this to log in to your unix account.  Note I said DUMB - it's not a VT100, so don't be tryin' to do VT100-y things, you'll just get screen gerb.
    
3.  When you've reached your unix prompt, select "Start IRC Session" from the Actions menu, and from here on, things are the same as they are with the TCP version, so just read the stuff in the sections above.  Whatever you do, DON'T try to help Homer out by running your unix IRC client, if you have one.  You'll mess things up crazy bad.
        
4.  When you're done, don't quit IRC yourself.  Instead, select "Close  IRC Session" from the Actions menu, and you'll be back to your friendly unix prompt.