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Realible serial terminal for MSDOS or Windows 3.11 for running Linux software. Termcap and various glitches.

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First post, by hansor

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Hi.

I'm using various terminal software(term95, netterm3, winqvt, win100) on DOS and Windows 3.11 to connect over serial to Linux machine (plain serial console over getty/agetty).
I have the following problems:

Despite using vt100 as terminal at 9600 over agetty DOS/Windows 3.11 have following problems:

  • 1. Software like top, Links or Lynx or even vi doesn't always render properly even when forcing pure text (no ansi or utf8) mode.
  • 2. Very often terminal freezes after few seconds of incoming data (let's say: "ps -aux" on Linux)- I need to hit enter or some other key in order to continue RECIVING data(sic!)
  • 3. What is the best termcap for DOS / Windows 3.11 client if not vt100 or vt52 ?
  • 4. When doing "sudo bash" over serial - I can't enter the password remotly, but only on server. Is it some kind of bug or bad agetty/getty configuration ?

Reply 1 of 6, by Jo22

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I like the Terminal from Windows 2.x..

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 2 of 6, by Grzyb

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Try Terminate.
Edit: oh dear, its website is still online - http://www.terminate.com/

Żywotwór planetarny, jego gnijące błoto, jest świtem egzystencji, fazą wstępną, i wyłoni się z krwawych ciastomózgowych miedź miłująca...

Reply 3 of 6, by darry

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Grzyb wrote on 2020-09-04, 00:04:

Try Terminate.
Edit: oh dear, its website is still online - http://www.terminate.com/

Terminate was great at the time . It was my favourite DOS terminal application For BBSing .

Reply 4 of 6, by Hawwy

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I know this a bit late, but I stumbled on this thread after alot of searching. It turns out the problem lies with Windows 3.1x's fonts. FixedSys (default) does not support certain characters from elinks or mc. I use the "Terminal" font from wfw3.11's Telnet client and the default terminal app. Also consider swiching from UTF8 to ISO-8859-1 in Linux. Hope this helps.

Reply 5 of 6, by Caluser2000

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Banana is Dos works fine. I just use the standard terminal in MS Windows 3.x.

There's a glitch in the matrix.
A founding member of the 286 appreciation society.
Apparently 32-bit is dead and nobody likes P4s.
Of course, as always, I'm open to correction...😉

Reply 6 of 6, by Jo22

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Hawwy wrote on 2021-07-18, 02:10:

I use the "Terminal" font from wfw3.11's Telnet client and the default terminal app. Also consider swiching from UTF8 to ISO-8859-1 in Linux. Hope this helps.

Hi, good choice! 😀

If you like, you can also try "MS LineDraw".
That's a TrueType Font that simulates Codepage 437 (CP437).

https://www.wfonts.com/font/ms-linedraw

CP437 was the default font displayed on IBM PCs.
It was intended for English language and based off some Wang typewriter.

CP437 was harcoded into the PC's BIOS and also stored on Hercules Graphics cards and clones
(they have an EPROM socket in order to use other codepages).

CP437 was common until ~DOS 3.x, when user selectable fonts became mainstream.

Hence, many programs from '87 and before, lile Norton Commander 1.x, assume that CP437 is used.
Text files for the DOS/PC platform, which are containing
special characters for ASCII art, were also made with CP437 in mind.

If "MODE CON" and other lines in the config files config.sys/autoexec.bat of DOS are disabled, modern DOS will fall back to the system's font, CP437 in most cases.

So using CP437 is worth a try.
It's also, more or less, a super set of plain 7-Bit ASCII.
Using it for a terminal program might be not the worst idea.

PS: I really recommend checking out Terminal 2.x, too.
It's very bare bone, which kind of contributes to its charme.
It will exactly do what is supposed to. Nothing more.

I haven't tried, but maybe it will still run on Windows 10 x86.
If not, maybe WineVDM/OTVDM can make it and other classic Win16 terminals run on Windows 1x x64.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYimGFLBxXQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6_PNpWEhNc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYU15CQcA-s

Last, but not least, please have a look at this gorgeous site:
https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

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