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Aucbvax.5937 fa.info-vax utcsrgv!utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!info-vax Sat Jan 23 19:33:05 1982 vt-100's >From cbosgd!mark@Berkeley Sat Jan 23 19:28:40 1982 I don't like vt100's either, because they are missing all the features I want a terminal to have. However, I have noticed that they are incredibly popular terminals. Inside the phone company, if you see a CRT computer terminal, I'd give you 100 to 1 odds that it's either a vt100 or a dataspeed 40. (I don't like 40's either, but that's another story.) There are also at least four companies who build terminals that are exact copies of vt100's except they are cheaper or more portable or something like that. So it's pretty obvious that a LOT of people really like vt100's. Let's ask why.

The vt100 is made by DEC. So all the DEC supplied software really works (relatively) well on DEC terminals. Also, getting your friendly DEC CE to service your system is easier if you have all DEC hardware. Many small groups really listen to this. (The phone company is hardly small but this is still a major consideration.)

The vt100 is very durable. You know how TPC builds equipment that you can drive over with a tank without harming. vt100's are said to survive very well in the field.

The vt100 (with the advanced video option) provides a set of functions that very few other terminals have. Scrolling region. Tall or wide characters. Bold characters. Smooth scroll (or "ooze mode" as we call it.) Unfortunately, many of these features (especially the scrolling region and tall/wide characters) were not very well designed. But they are there and they do work. And I've seen an amazing amount of software written that really uses these features. Of course this software has the vt100 escape sequences hardwired into it, so it won't work on anything else. Yet another reason for people who want to use it to buy vt100's.

However, I do worry that we will be caught in this trap. If I were designing a new terminal, I certainly would NOT want it to look or act like a vt100. I would make windows like the concept 100, which have four edges and everything done only affects them; not scrolling regions with only two edges that only affect scrolling. I would not home the cursor every time the scrolling region is changed. (Does anyone have any idea why the vt100 does this?) I would certainly make the tall/wide characters work on a character by character basis just like other kinds of highlighting, not on a line by line basis. And I would include insert/delete line/character. (The vt132 has this, but the specs indicate it's a few times slower than the vt100 - needs much more padding. Also, nobody buys them. I wonder why?) I would not accept a requirement that it be upward compatible with the vt100, although I fear this eventually happening. (After all, the vt100 uses the ANSI standard, with the corresponding verbose sequences. Couldn't they have put in a four byte address cursor command for speed?)

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