Re: gnome-5250

["Jason M. Felice" <jfelice@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Sean Porterfield wrote:

> I found that I had the same formattable.h error, but then I realized
> I had never run "make install" on tn5250 since it overwrites my XTerm.
> After installing tn5250, gnome-5250 compiled.  I must say, I'm
> impressed!  I like the drop-downs so we won't have to remember cryptic
> options.

I'm thinking the preferences dialog should be re-organized, but I haven't
figured out the most logical way to do this yet. I'm certainly going to keep
the multiple-choice items, tho...

Note: none of the preferences actually have an effect on your session yet -
the dialog is pretty much a mock-up at this point.

> Is there support for multiple session settings?  I was looking for
> "File: Open" and "File: Save" to make profiles of sorts.  I admit, I
> haven't tried out the session settings in preferences yet.

And here.... I haven't figured out how to do this.  I'm thinking the best
likelyhood is that there will be a 'Connect...'  option which brings up the
property dialog, and also a 'Sessions' sub-menu under the file menu.  This
would contain one menu option per pre-configured session.

The sessions would be stored in ~/.tn5250rc as they are now, and would
be available across tn5250, xt5250, gnome-5250 and gtk-5250.

> On the map setting, is there also a text version of the map number?  Or
> do people who use other maps usually know the map number?  (I'm using
> 37, so it doesn't affect me, just a suggestion for end users who might
> not know.)

I think we should have descriptions, regardless of whether users would
typically know.  (Just something intimidating about 'pick one of the
following numbers'.)

> I saw the message that said "not all keys are implemented" so I'm
> probably pointing out the obvious here:
> ** WARNING **: unhandled key 0xFFE2 (Shift_R)
> ** WARNING **: unhandled key 0xFFE1 (Shift_L)

No harm done here.  I put this warning in so that I can catch when I use
a key that isn't handled yet, but with 5250 emulators, right shift and
left shift aren't *supposed* to do anything by themselves.  (Well maybe
they will for some weirdo once we get keyboard mapping.)  Let me know if
this message is produced when you use some key that should work.


> The only other problem I have right off is that I can't copy and paste
> like in an xterm.  (Windows users are amazed at how fast I can copy and
> paste, especially when it's just one word and I can double click it.)
> Oh, and if copy/paste isn't too big a deal, does cursor positioning by
> mouse-click follow?

Cursor positioning by mouse-click should be implemented in both the console-
based emulator and the Gnome/GTK+ emulators, I think.  I have to provide the
proper interface to the terminal front-ends here.

Copy and paste will pretty much mean I have to dig into some docs, because
I've never made my own widget, and edit controls and such handle their own
copy and paste.

As for mouse support in the future, I have a few ideas that I've seen in other
emulators which I think are really cool.  First, the ability to click on a menu
item to select it is pretty neat (this also works with function key labels). I'm

not sure of all the heuristics involved, but I've seen evidence that this is
possible (see PowerTerm from EricSoft).  This in no way affects cursor
placement via mouse click, because you would only place the cursor in
editable fields, and you would only click on non-editable regions of the
screen to select function keys and menu items.

I'm also wondering about drag-and-drop support, there has got to be some
useful things we can do here.  Dropping a file on the emulator window should
certainly open a file transfer dialog.  Dropping text is the same as pasting
(e.g. stuffing the keys into the keyboard buffer).

> Thanks!  This is a FANTASTIC start.
>

;-)

The other note - as mentioned before, the terminal doesn't resize, so you're
stuck with 80x25 right now.  That should probably be the next issue to address.

(Hmm, let me see if I can get that done by the end of my lunch break <g>)

>
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