[Freehoo-users] Re: Freehoo in VT320 terminal

[Anand Babu]

,----[ John Kerr Anderson <address@hidden> ]
| Hello,
| 
| I have been using Freehoo in a terminal and have noticed odd
| behaviour. I don't know exactly what the problem is.  Freehoo works
| great in an Xterm or console.  If I use it on a VT320 terminal it
| works fine except when I try sending a message more than 1 line
| long.  If I continue typing more than 1 line, instead of the screen
| moving up a line, it overwrites what I'm typing beginning in the far
| left column.  So it becomes very difficult to follow.  Is there any
| way that could allow it to work better in a terminal?  Any help
| would be appreciated.  I'm using the latest ver. of Freehoo in
| Debian Linux Woody.
| 
| Thank you in advance
`----
Do you mean real VT320 dumb terminal?, I have never used one and I am
not a terminal expert.

I am not sure "by overwrite" you mean erasing the previously typed 
characters or the line shifts (scrolls) horizontally.

Try this in a working (gnome-terminal or xterm)

        $ bind 'set horizontal-scroll-mode on'
        $ bind -v| grep horizontal-scroll-mode
        set horizontal-scroll-mode on

and see if you get the same vt320 kind of behavior.

Check the value of the TERM variable and the appropriate termcap
entry.  By default 'horizontal-scroll-mode' is off. Readline needs to
be able to move the cursor up and down and likes to know whether the
terminal supports autowrap.  If your terminal type is unknown or the
corresponding termcap/terminfo entry is incomplete or incorrect,
doesn't know how to move the cursor and forces horizontal scrolling.   

"$ info readline"  and look for "Readline Init File::" section.
Readline has some customization feature thru .inputrc startup file.

Debian GNU/Linux doesn't use termcap. Try 
"$ apt-cache show termcap-compat" 
for more info.

Let me know if you find a fix.
-- 
Anand Babu
Free as in Freedom <www.gnu.org>