RT11 DEC graphics chars not displayed on KED Help Screen

[Chris Jordan]

This puzzles me.  I boot up RT11, EDIT a file, which opens the file in KED v1.27, and hit the Help key, which brings up the help screen.  On the help screen it looks like KED is trying to use the DEC graphic characters to draw boxes, however that doesn't display properly on my terminal window, it just shows up as l's and q's, etc. (see the screenshot below).

So I figure, my terminal window (which is just the Mac "terminal" program with the top four buttons of the numeric keypad redefined to give me PF1 through PF4) must not be able to display the graphics characters.  However I wrote a little MACRO11 program to print them all out, and they display correctly when I run it (see the second screenshot below).  So the Mac "terminal" program is able to display those characters, but KED isn't showing them on the help screen.  Any idea what to look at next?

Thanks,

Chris Jordan

[Anton Lavrentiev]

Can it be something with the 8-bit cleanness maybe?

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "[PiDP-11]" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/1181c4bc-a18c-48d1-bf8f-a8266884dad8n%40googlegroups.com.

[Warner Losh]

The characters are supposed to be in the switched in character set that replaces lower case. They are not used much these days, so maybe the emulator doesn't implement them?

Warner 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/CAAo%3Dyr2bqLwdpm_a5k89ZukwKGmOdEs_RDPOfX18jG3Ju1ty6g%40mail.gmail.com.

[Johnny Billquist]

There is usually some way to get the data captured/logged to a file.
Turn that on and then we can tell what the problem is.

Johnny

On 2022-05-31 00:54, Chris Jordan wrote:
> This puzzles me.  I boot up RT11, EDIT a file, which opens the file in
> KED v1.27, and hit the Help key, which brings up the help screen.  On
> the help screen it looks like KED is trying to use the DEC graphic
> characters to draw boxes, however that doesn't display properly on my
> terminal window, it just shows up as l's and q's, etc. (see the
> screenshot below).
>
> So I figure, my terminal window (which is just the Mac "terminal"
> program with the top four buttons of the numeric keypad redefined to
> give me PF1 through PF4) must not be able to display the graphics
> characters.  However I wrote a little MACRO11 program to print them all
> out, and they display correctly when I run it (see the second screenshot
> below).  So the Mac "terminal" program is able to display those
> characters, but KED isn't showing them on the help screen.  Any idea
> what to look at next?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Chris Jordan
>

> Screen Shot 2022-05-30 at 4.30.50 PM.png

> Screen Shot 2022-05-30 at 4.31.36 PM.png
>

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "[PiDP-11]" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
> an email to pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit
> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/1181c4bc-a18c-48d1-bf8f-a8266884dad8n%40googlegroups.com

> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/1181c4bc-a18c-48d1-bf8f-a8266884dad8n%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

--
Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus
|| on a psychedelic trip
email: b...@softjar.se || Reading murder books
pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

[Johnny Billquist]

Note that he get the graphics characters displayed correctly from his
own program. So there is nothing wrong with the emulator in that way.

Anton's suggestions about something around 8-bit cleanliness is similar
to what I'm thinking as well. But unless we can get some logs, it's
impossible to say for sure.

Johnny

> Screen Shot 2022-05-30 at 4.30.50 PM.png

> Screen Shot 2022-05-30 at 4.31.36 PM.png
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the
> Google Groups "[PiDP-11]" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from
> it, send an email to pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit
> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/1181c4bc-a18c-48d1-bf8f-a8266884dad8n%40googlegroups.com

> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/1181c4bc-a18c-48d1-bf8f-a8266884dad8n%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "[PiDP-11]" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it,
> send an email to pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/CAAo%3Dyr2bqLwdpm_a5k89ZukwKGmOdEs_RDPOfX18jG3Ju1ty6g%40mail.gmail.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/CAAo%3Dyr2bqLwdpm_a5k89ZukwKGmOdEs_RDPOfX18jG3Ju1ty6g%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "[PiDP-11]" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
> an email to pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/CANCZdfr_v%3DktQkQD7Vf4EW9njDweWNSiEs0kKgtpCEKbFbZfxw%40mail.gmail.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/CANCZdfr_v%3DktQkQD7Vf4EW9njDweWNSiEs0kKgtpCEKbFbZfxw%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

[Chris Jordan]

Johnny,

Good idea about the logs.  I'm connecting to the pidp11 using ssh to the "screen" session there, so screen will do logging (C-a H toggles that).  A selection from that is below.  That shows KED is not sending the escape sequences around the (presumed) graphics characters, but is sending the escape sequences for reverse video (which displays correctly).

********************************************************************

       KED V01.27 

                 Lower Function is GOLD

   lqqqqqqqqqqqwqqqqqqqqqqqwqqqqqqqqqqqwqqqqqqqqqqqk

   xESC[7m           ESC[mx           x FINDNEXT  x  DELLINE  x  DELETE    Erase char left

   xESC[7m   GOLD    ESC[mx   HELP    x           x           x  LINEFEED  Erase word left

   xESC[7m        PF1ESC[mx        PF2xESC[7m   FIND PF3ESC[mxESC[7m UNDELLINE 

ESC[mx  CTRL/U    Erase line left

********************************************************************

So maybe KED doesn't think my terminal can display the graphics characters, and so doesn't send the escape sequences?  I didn't think KED was quite that smart though...

Thinking about Anton's and your suggestions about 8 bit cleanliness, I updated /opt/pidp11/systems/rt11/boot.ini to add

set tto 7b

and that fixed it, hurray!  Thanks!  It also fixed that mysterious untouchable letter "a" as the last character of my file (it's supposed to be a patterned block character that shows the end of the file).  I don't actually understand why that change works - the simh manual says the default is 8b, which means "no changes", while 7b clears the high-order bit, but anyway it works.

I think it would be reasonable to update the boot.ini file in the distribution with that option.  What's the proper way to request that?

Chris Jordan

  

[Anton Lavrentiev]

My theory would be that the terminal driver might generate a parity bit (8th bit) that the terminal (emulator) itself does not like.  Setting the line to 7b strips the bit and makes the 7bit clean value work correctly "in hardware".

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to pidp-11+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-11/a3ad011b-7773-46f1-8f67-21302ee34041n%40googlegroups.com.

[jon....@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, May 31, 2022 at 4:44:14 PM UTC-5 cwjor...@gmail.com wrote:

So maybe KED doesn't think my terminal can display the graphics characters, and so doesn't send the escape sequences?  I didn't think KED was quite that smart though...

In my experience, similar types of things tend to happen with software of this age and modern terminal emulators. Often setting a specific terminal type (like vt100) resolves issues like this.