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1995-07-16
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112 lines
!SerialTrm 1.10beta by The Angelos tou Thanatou
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ever wanted to use command line stuff using a different keyboard & monitor
so you didn't have to mess up your desktop by using 'f12' or a taskwindow?
!SerialTrm runs a taskwindow and directs all output to the serial port.
Input from the serial port is directed to the taskwindow. The practical
upshot of this is that by connecting a suitable terminal (see later) to
your serial port, you can have a taskwindow that uses the terminal for
all IO. Suprisingly useful. No, really.
What do I mean by a 'suitable termninal'? Well, for a start it should send
ASCII code 10 for 'Return', and it should output LF's and CR's properly (ie.
ASCII 10 = linefeed only, ASCII 13 = carriage return only).
"Argh!", you cry, "I have no such terminal!". Well, if you have a beeb/master,
you do, it's in the !SendTerm application supplied, and what's more, simply
double-click !SendTerm and everything's taken care of.
What sort of serial cable do I need? See a bit later in this file for info.
Usage
~~~~~
Double click on the !SerialTrm icon in a filer window. An icon will install
itself on the left hand side of the icon bar; it'll probably flash an arrow and
then a star followed by a blinking cursor at you. The icon reflects what the
application is currently doing: an arrow pointing at the 'serial port' means
that text is being output to the terminal, and arrow pointing 'in' from it
means that text is being input from the terminal. Other possibilities are: a
line (reinitialising), a star & blinking cursor (idle), a '!' sign (an serious
error / buffer full), some paws (paused... sorry).
Icon bar menu
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You can restart and pause the task from the icon bar menu. Note that when I say
'task' I mean the task running under the taskwindow (eg. the CLI, Basic, etc).
You can also quit the application from here.
'restart' restarts the taskwindow. Its effect is exactly the same as quiting
and restarting the application (provided you haven't altered it whilst running
it of course).
'pause' pauses the taskwindow. No more output will be generated, input will
stack up in the serial buffer though. This shouldn't be a problem. Pause is
only really useful if you absolutely *need* every CPUsec of processor time for
some desktop task. Oh, and to go 'awww' at the cute icon.
Configuration
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
See the !Run file for details of how you can configure !SerialTrm
Note that as supplied Hi-res sprites are used. You can rename the sprite files
in the !SerialTrm directory if you want lo-res sprites. (The Sprites24 file is
the low-res version of the file SpriteFile). Sorry about this, I just can't be
bothered to fix it in the code :-)
Notes
~~~~~
You can alter the amount of memory allocated to the taskwindow by using the
wimpslot command from the terminal. eg. '*wimpslot 1024k' will allocate 1Mbyte
to the task(window).
Sadly, if you're using a screen mode that doesn't have 80 columns, directory
catalogues will be mangled on the terminal. This is because *cat, etc. read the
current screen dimensions and then format their output acordingly. Any other
(misbehaved?) software that does this will also suffer from this problem. A fix
is way too complex to be worthwhile.
Cable Wiring
~~~~~~~~~~~~
|| Note, no account is take on the Hardware Bugs present in the old Serial
|| Chips.
|| The practical upshot of this is that your serial cable should be wired 'as
|| standard' rather than any of the 'fancy' work arounds. Hey, let's face it we
|| only need the RTS,CTS,TxD & RxD lines anyway...
|| The cable I use is wired:
||
|| ARC Beeb/Master
|| (9 pin Dtype socket) (5 pin 'Domino' DIN plug)
|| ____________ _- -_
|| \ 1 2 3 4 5 / / 5 4 \ (both viewed looking at the
|| \ 6 7 8 9 / > 1 | *back* of the plug (ie.
|| ~~~~~~~~~ \ 2 3 / at the bits you solder to))
|| ~-___-~
|| Connections:
|| ARC BEEB
|| +----1
|| | 2--------------------3
|| | 3--------------------4
|| +----4
|| | 5--------------------1
|| +----6
|| 7--------------------2
|| 8--------------------5
|| 9
Disclaimer
~~~~~~~~~~
Use of this software is completely at your own risk. In particular,
construction of a connecting cable to the above instructions is completely at
the risk of the contructor. The author can accept no responsibility for any
damage/loss arising from the use, or inability to use this software. No
warranty, express or implied, applies to this software. This is not PD: the
Copyright in this software belongs at all times to the author. However,
permission is granted for unrestricted distribution prodividing that *no*
charge is made for the distribution [a charge may be made for handling/media]
and that the whole of the software is supplied intact and unaltered. Permission
is also granted for unrestricted use and alteration of the software [but if you
fix a bug / add anything nice, let me know so I can patch the 'master' version].
Bug reports / comments / etc to:
Angelos tou Thanatou c/o 23 Baronsway, Whitkirk, Leeds, LS15 7AW, England.
(until Sept-ish '96: n0ae3@newton.ncl.ac.uk, voice 0191 2848108)