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Aterm Users Guide ----------------- OVERVIEW: Aterm is a general purpose terminal program that incorporates the basic necessities, such as ASCII and protocol file transfer ability, as well as features to make life easier for the user. Following is a list of the main features of Aterm: > Baud rates - 300, 1200, 2400, 4800, 9600 - initial rate set from Preferences. > File transfers - ASCII transmit/capture to any device. Prompted transmit with user definable prompt. - XMODEM (checksum) - XMODEM (CRC) - SuperKermit (Sliding Windows Kermit) > Duplex control - Full, Half, Echo. > Function keys - User definable. - May be saved/loaded along with other parameters. - Function keys may be chained/loaded from key defintion. - Function key files may be in S: directory. - Provision for default function key file. > Autochop - Uses "hunk-end" padding during XMODEM send to eliminate need for chopping at receiving end. - Automatic pad stripping on XMODEM downloads. - Properly pads/strips executable and ARCed files. > Flow control - Xon/Xoff selectable (enabled/disabled) > CHAT mode - A split screen mode that allows entry of one line of text, which is sent as a "block" when a <RETURN> is entered. Prevents mixing of incoming/outgoing lines when used in CO. > Clock - Clock runs in title bar if present in C: directory. > Phone book - Stores numbers (up to 10 per phone book file). - Autodial from phone list. - Optionally loads Function Key file from list. *============================* HARDWARE REQUIRED: Any RS232 modem that can be controlled with ASCII text strings, ie. Hayes or compatible. Please note that Aterm does not require any other RS232 lines than TXD, RXD, and SIGNAL GROUND. No other lines (DSR, CTS, CD, etc.) are checked. You may have to set your modem DIP switches to simulate DTR being present. *============================* INSTALLING ATERM: There are a few configurations that you may want to use, depending solely upon your personal preferences. 1. Aterm, AtermClock, Init.Key, and any other Function Key or Phone Book files in CD (current directory). 2. Aterm in any other directory. AtermClock in C: directory. Init.Key and other FKey or Phone Book files in S: directory. 3. Aterm and AtermClock in C: directory. Init.Key and other FKey or Phone Book files in S: directory. If you use Aterm a lot, option 3 is the easiest way to go. A brief explanation of the operation as applied to AtermClock and FKey files will help you decide how to configure the environment. When Aterm loads, it will attempt to load AtermClock, which runs as a separate task, from the current directory. If it not present in the CD, Aterm will attempt to load it from the C: directory. (This is the 'c' directory on your boot disk if you have not used ASSIGN to change it) If it is still not found, Aterm will decide that you did not want the clock, and will tell you it could not be found. Running without the clock in no way impacts Aterm's operation. Aterm then attempts to load a file called Init.Key from the current directory. If not found, it will try to load it from the S: directory. (The 's' directory on your boot disk if you have not used ASSIGN to change it) If it is not found, Aterm will set its own defaults, with the exception of the baud rate, which will take the value specified by your Preferences (from a file called 'system-configuration'). I use the last option, but you may prefer to use one of the others. I have Aterm in my C: directory, with the name Aterm. While you can name Aterm anything you desire, AtermClock and Init.Key must be as specified, or they will not be found by Aterm. *============================* OPERATION GETTING STARTED: Invoke Aterm by the following methods... (assuming it is named Aterm) If Aterm is in the C: directory or if it is in the current directory: RUN Aterm If it is in another directory... (assume it is in DF1: directory 'terminals') RUN DF1:terminals/Aterm NOTE: Capitals are optional. NOTE: The RUN is optional, but if used, greatly enhances the use of Aterm. It will allow you to run other programs from the CLI, which may be seen by simply clicking on the 'push to back' gadget on Aterm's screen. To return to Aterm, click on the same gadget in the CLI screen. The CLI window may also be left in front and resized. I often edit or print files, compile, or rearrange disks while uploading or downloading. Unlike some commercial terminal programs, Aterm does not make a pig of itself by hogging the printer port (or any other system resources it isn't currently using). At this time, Aterm will load, then try to load the clock and default function key file, and you will see a title screen. Provided your modem is hooked up and powered on, you may now start to use it. The only way to have an Init.Key file is to create one with Aterm. To do this, simply use the right (menu) button on the mouse to set up the parameters that you will want to use. The settable parameters are: Prompt - Settable from the 'File' menu. Baud - Select the baud rate from the 'Baud' menu if you want Aterm to come up with a different setting than that specified in your Preferences. Mode - Half, Full, or Echo, settable from the 'Mode' menu. Autochop - On/Off, settable from the 'Miscellaneous' menu. Xon/Xoff - On/Off, settable from the 'Miscellaneous' menu. Protocol - XMODEM, XMODEM CRC, Kermit, from the 'Miscellaneous' menu. You may also wish to define some function keys at this time. When you have everything set to your satisfaction, select 'FKey Save' from the 'Miscellaneous' menu. You will be prompted for the file name you wish to save the file under. Type one of the following, ending your input with a <RETURN>. Init.Key S:Init.Key DF1:terminal/Init.Key Depending on your preferred configuration as outlined above. ---------------------------- At this time, you may also wish to set up a Phone Book. To do so, select "Phone Book" from the Miscellaneous menu. You will be presented with a contrasting window with a number of features. For now, we will just make a default Phone Book file. The default Phone Book file is called Term.Phn, and will be found in the S: directory along with the Init.key file, if you have decided to put it there. You can have a Phone Book in any directory, but in order to have it come up without having to type in the name, it should be "S:Term.Phn". Move the mouse pointer to the box immediately following "Dial Prefix:", and click the left button. A cursor should appear in the box. The dial prefix will be dependent upon the modem you are using. If it is one that requires no prefix, simply use the <right Amiga> and 'X' keys together to erase the contents of the box. You may also enter any CTRL keys in the normal way, including carriage returns (CTRL M). The prefix will be used for all numbers on the list. Now enter the names of the BBS's or services you wish to call under the "Name:" column, and the numbers for them under "Number:", using the mouse pointer and left button to select each field in turn. When you are done, click the "Save" box, and your file will be saved under the name "S:Term.Phn". More on the interaction between the Phone Book and Function Key files later. ---------------------------- Next, a step by step tour of the items in the menus. Please note that any menu items followed by the <Amiga> symbol may be selected by holding down the right <Amiga> key, and typing the key that is shown immediately after the symbol in the menu. ie. <Right Amiga> C will initiate ASCII capture mode, or terminate it if it is already capturing. File: ASCII Capture: You will be asked for a file name. The file named will be opened for writing, and anything appearing on your screen will be written to the file. CTRL characters are for the most part suppressed so that the file may be edited with ED. If no path is given, the file will be written to your current directory. Good results are obtained by capturing to RAM:, but care must be taken to ensure that you have enough memory to hold the data. You may capture to RAM:, DF0:, DF1:, DH0: PRT:, or any other device that may be added to the Amiga at a later date. To end the ASCII capture, you simply select ASCII capture again. ASCII Transmit: You will be asked for a file name. The file named will be opened for reading, and the contents of the file will be sent out on the modem port. If no path is given, the file must be in the current directory. The ASCII transmit will be terminated when the file has been sent in its entirety, and may be terminated earlier by selecting ASCII Transmit again. The Promt character, if enabled acts as a 'throttle', and each time a carriage return is sent from the file, Aterm will wait for the prompt character before sending the next line. See entry for 'Prompt' below. Binary Receive: You will be asked for a file name. The file named will be opened for writing, and as the file is received (using the protocol selected in the 'Miscellaneous' menu), it will be written. The file may contain any sort of data, and it will not be changed in any way. As with ASCII Capture, you may Receive to any device (except the printer). To abort the transfer early, press the <ESC> key. The host may 'lock up' at this time, but will usually respond to a few <RETURN>s, CTRL Zz, or CTRL Xs. Binary Transmit: You will be asked for a file name. The named file will be opened for reading, and the contents of it will be sent unchanged to the host or other terminal program via the protocol selected. Please note that the host or other terminal program must be using the same protocol as you are. The protocol used is dependent upon the setting of the protocol selection in the Miscellaneous menu. The transfer may be aborted early by pressing the <ESC> key. Prompt: The prompt character is a user definable character that is used to 'pace' the ASCII Transmit operation. If a 'full blast' transmission is desired, simply type a '0' to set the prompt character to its "inactive" state. To set it to any other character, press the key desired when asked to supply a character. A common character to use is <RETURN>. The operation of the prompted ASCII Transmit is as follows... Aterm will transmit 1 line of the file, then wait until it receives the prompt character from the modem. When The prompt character is received, the next line will be sent. This helps to ensure that the host or other terminal is ready to receive more data. Baud: Use the mouse to select any baud rate from 300 to 9600 baud. Mode: Half: Half duplex (not really duplex, but 'local echo', but who's being picky?), will cause all characters sent to the modem to also be printed to the screen. Use this setting if the host or other terminal does not echo your own characters to you. Full: Use when the host or other terminal echos your characters to you. All characters you type will be sent to the modem only, and you are depending on the other end to send them back so you can see them. Switch to this setting if you are getting double characters, ie. HHeelllloo.. Echo: Sends any characters received from the modem back out to the modem. Use this setting if you wish to echo characters to the other end. Be careful with this one, as it has some strange side effects if enabled during up or downloads, or whenever you are connected to a host or other terminal that also echos your characters. Miscellaneous: FKey Load: You will be asked for a file name. This file will be used as a function key definition and 'settings' file. The file MUST be one previously generated by Aterm with the FKey Save function. As with Init.Key, it may either be in the current directory or the S: directory. If it is in neither, you will have to specify the complete path. FKey Save: You will be asked for a file name. Your current function key definitions and menu settings will be written to the named file. Please note that if you want the file anywhere but the current directory, that you will need to specify the path, ie. S:name or DF1:term/name. Define FKey: You will be asked for a function key string definition. This is a string of characters that you wish to be sent when a function key is pressed. First, you must tell Aterm which function key to define. This is done by pressing the appropriate function key. You may only define the function keys on the top row, and they are limited to 40 characters each. There is a way to have a longer definition, as well as being able to define more keys, but this will be covered in a later section. All characters are legal in a function key definition, including all CTRL characters, <CR>, <TAB>, <ESC>, etc. To end the definition, press any function key. The reason for splitting the extra options in the definition is that they are temporary 'quick and dirty' solutions, and will be changed in future revisions to Aterm. Auto Chop: Set this to 'ON' to download executable, ARCed and text files. Set to 'OFF" for 'problem files' that may have been uploaded with a program that does not properly pad the end of the file. Files such as icons, graphics, instrument, etc, may be chopped too short if they are autochopped. In this case it it better to leave them unchopped and to attempt to chop them to the right length offline. Xon/Xoff: Set this 'ON' for flow control. If you are sending to a host, it will sometimes require you to wait while it is busy doing something else. To signal that this is the case, it will send you an 'Xoff' ( CTRL S ), and when it is ready for more data, it will send you an 'Xon' ( CTRL Q ). Sometimes, however, especially when dealing with a packet switching network, certain conditions may cause the network to send an 'Xoff', without a corresponding 'Xon'. This will lock up the terminal program, and will mean that to recover, you will have to reboot the Amiga <CTRL-Amiga-Amiga>, to recover. Line noise may also send you an unintentional CTRL S. In these cases, select 'OFF' for this option. Protocol: XModem: This is the 'plain' checksum Xmodem. Xmodem CRC: This is a better XModem protocol, with better error checking. If you select this option, and the other side does not support it, there will be a delay, then both sides will go back to the 'plain' XModem. To avoid this delay, set Xmodem to match the other side. Kermit: This is an implementation of Sliding Windows Kermit, and is superior in speed and error checking to XModem, especially over packet switching networks. When a file transfer is started, both ends will "negotiate for parameters", using the best of the Kermit protocols that both ends can handle. Thus, this implementation may interact with any lesser versions, using the best parameters that the lesser version can handle. The authors would appreciate hearing about any compatibility problems encountered with lesser versions. CHAT Mode: This gives you a 'split screen', a window along the bottom of the screen that you can type a line of text into. The text you type is held in a buffer and will only be sent when you end the line with a <RETURN>. While the line is being typed, the upper part of the screen will still show any characters arriving from the modem port. While the line is being sent, no characters arriving from the modem will be printed. This does wonders for the readability of the screen while participating in real time CO. When connected to another terminal, and you are chatting, the worst that can happen is that your line interrupts the other line only once, instead of having your characters and those from the other side mixed randomly throughout the line. Phone Book: Allows you to enter names and numbers of services or BBS's that you call frequently. More than one phone book file may be accessed. Enter the name of the file in the "File:" box. There is an interaction between Function Key files and Phone Book entries. Though you can load Function Key files from the menu, you can also load them from the Phone Book. Simply make sure that the name of the Function Key file is the same as the name in the "Name:" field of the number you want to dial. For instance, if there is a Function Key file called "CIS" either in the current directory or in the S: directory, AND if an entry in the Phone Book "Name:" field is "CIS", then when you click on the DIAL box to the left of that name, Aterm will attempt to load the file "CIS" as a Function Key file, first from the current directory, then from the S: directory. NOTE: If for any reason you do not wish to load a Function Key file, just precede the name with a space in the "Name:" field. Aterm will take this as a signal that you do not want a Function Key file, and will not even look for it. *============================* ADDENDUM FKEY OPTIONS: In addition to the standard characters allowed in function keys, there are a few special keys that will, when the function key is sent, perform some special tasks. These are designed to extend the function keys, making them for all practical purposes, of unlimited length, and giving you the ability to change your key definitions automatically as you move from area to area within a network or bulletin board. NOTE: The method used to implement these special functions is temporary, constituting a 'quick and dirty' solution. The authors would be glad to hear from Aterm users about any ideas on implementation of this feature. The special options are <Fn:>, <LOAD>, and <LOADEX>. In all cases, these must be the last thing defined as part of a function key definition (you'll see why in a moment). They are activated as follows. Select 'Define FKey' from the menu (or use the <right Amiga>D ). Press the function key to be defined. Enter whatever text you want sent to the modem prior to the execution of the special command. Press the <DEL> key. Now press one of... Any number key (1-0) The 'l' key (lower case L) The 'L' key (upper case l) The visual indication of these will be (in the same order)... <Fn:> (where n is the number pressed) <LOAD> <LOADEX> The meanings and additional information to be supplied for each function are: <Fn:> - This will cause the currently defined function key specified by 'n' to be sent/executed. '0' specifies FKey 10. <LOAD> - This one MUST be followed by the name of a file that contains a function key definition. Upon executing the this command, Aterm will attempt to load this file as a function key definition. Handy for 'switching the context' of your function keys when going to a different section of a network or BBS. <LOADEX> - MUST be followed by a single digit (1-0), then immediately by a file name. The file named must be a function key definition file. Aterm will attempt to load this file as a function key definition file, and if loaded, will then execute the newly defined key specified by the number immediately after the <LOADEX> symbol. NOTE: If you wish to include a real <DEL> character in a function key defintiton, just press the <DEL> key twice. The best way to find out about the uses for these functions is to play with them. *============================* Aterm Documentation file (C) November 1986 by Larry Phillips Documentation Revisions for Aterm 7.3 (C) Dec. 1986 by Larry Phillips Compuserve 76703,4322