Going to try to emulate an VT220 LK style keyboard with a Mac USB keyboard + Terminal.app bindings

[Sampsa Laine]

Guys,

SInce USB LK keyboards cost an arm and a leg, I've decided to sort of build my own. Since I'm an OS X user I'll be using Terminal.app mostly for access to my VMS boxes and figured I'd get the full USB (with keypad) Mac keyboard (about 50 USD), remap the keys as closely as possible to an LK, and maybe print some tiny labels on what is what :)

If I manage to do this successfully, I'll let you know and post the Terminal.app key bindings for anyone else who might be interested.

[JF Mezei]

Post by Sampsa Laine
SInce USB LK keyboards cost an arm and a leg, I've decided to sort of build my own. Since I'm an OS X user I'll be using Terminal.app mostly for access to my VMS boxes and figured I'd get the full USB (with keypad) Mac keyboard (about 50 USD), remap the keys as closely as possible to an LK, and maybe print some tiny labels on what is what :)

UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the
apple keyboard are missing the upper left key in the 6 keys above the
arrow keys. (the key is physically there, but rendered
inoperative/totally useless by lower level software)

[Sampsa Laine]

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the

Will have a look at that once I get the keyboard

Post by JF Mezei
apple keyboard are missing the upper left key in the 6 keys above the
arrow keys. (the key is physically there, but rendered
inoperative/totally useless by lower level software)

Yeah, that's the 'fn' key right? I'll probably move the LK function somewhere else or map it to somewhere nearby. I think they keyboard will have enough keys to pull this off, even if I have to use fn+<Key> for some less commonly used functions...

[Sampsa Laine]

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the

Actually that'll remap the keyboard for the whole box, not just the Terminal.app profile - I'd prefer to have "normal" functionality when in OS X apps and LK mode when in Terminal. So I think it'll be the tedious job of hacking in control sequences for LK keys into Terminal.app's keyboard config.

If I get it working, I'll post the mapping file and a photo of the finished keyboard on my website :)

[Martin Vorlaender]

Post by Sampsa Laine

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the

Actually that'll remap the keyboard for the whole box, not just the
Terminal.app profile - I'd prefer to have "normal" functionality when in
OS X apps and LK mode when in Terminal. So I think it'll be the tedious
job of hacking in control sequences for LK keys into Terminal.app's
keyboard config.
If I get it working, I'll post the mapping file and a photo of the
finished keyboard on my website :)

I did some hacking using iTerm2's Keyboard Presets (see attachment),
but only did some cursory testing in an SSH connection to a VMS system.

Just drop it into iTerm.app/Contents/Resources/ (after copying the original
file to a safe place, of course).

cu,

Martin

[V***@SendSpamHere.ORG]

Post by Sampsa Laine

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the

Will have a look at that once I get the keyboard

It won't permit numeric keypad definitions.

[Sampsa Laine]

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the
apple keyboard are missing the upper left key in the 6 keys above the
arrow keys. (the key is physically there, but rendered
inoperative/totally useless by lower level software)

Actually on mine it's "fn" which is quite useful for Mac stuff (i.e. the volume/brightness buttons etc)..

How many F-keys did the VT220 have, I've got 19 on the Mac one so might map the missing key to one of those. Or a shifted version of the key next to it..

[Paul Sture]

Post by Sampsa Laine

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the
apple keyboard are missing the upper left key in the 6 keys above the
arrow keys. (the key is physically there, but rendered
inoperative/totally useless by lower level software)

Actually on mine it's "fn" which is quite useful for Mac stuff (i.e. the
volume/brightness buttons etc)..
How many F-keys did the VT220 have, I've got 19 on the Mac one so
might map the missing key to one of those. Or a shifted version of the
key next to it..

Mac keyboards should be at an advantage here because of the 20 F-keys on
the VT220 keyboard, the first five were not accessible by VMS or any
other operating system; they were reserved for local terminal operations

<http://vt100.net/docs/vt220-rm/chapter3.html#S3.2.4>

"3.2.4 Top-Row Function Keys

There are 20 top-row function keys, F1 through F20. The first five keys
(F1 through F5) labeled Hold Screen, Print Screen, Set-Up, Data/Talk,
and Break, do not send codes; they are local function keys. Keys F6
through F20 send the codes defined in Table 3-4."

Beware though of the problem caused by the maintainers of iTerm around
2006(?). They decided to switch from a mapping of the F-keys which
decently resembled a physical VT220 keyboard to something "more Mac/PC
like", turning what had been a useful VT220 emulator into enough
of a pain in the neck that I trashed the program.

[David Froble]

Post by Paul Sture
Beware though of the problem caused by the maintainers of iTerm around
2006(?). They decided to switch from a mapping of the F-keys which
decently resembled a physical VT220 keyboard to something "more Mac/PC
like", turning what had been a useful VT220 emulator into enough
of a pain in the neck that I trashed the program.

Don't you like it when someone thinks they know better what you want
than you yourself do?

[Paul Sture]

Post by David Froble

Post by Paul Sture
Beware though of the problem caused by the maintainers of iTerm around
2006(?). They decided to switch from a mapping of the F-keys which
decently resembled a physical VT220 keyboard to something "more Mac/PC
like", turning what had been a useful VT220 emulator into enough
of a pain in the neck that I trashed the program.

Don't you like it when someone thinks they know better what you want
than you yourself do?

Yup :-(

I've just had a look at iTerm (my copy is dated July 2011 and the About
dialogue reports it as iTerm2 version 1.0.0), and the keypad does work
in EDT and TPU, though after a quick try I would need an extended
session using one or both of those to convince myself it's 100%
reliable.

However, PF1-PF4 are mapped to F1-F4 which ruins the idea of
GOLD-anything being done in the way God intended.

F5-F7 produce KP4- KP7 and F8 produces KP-comma

F9-F12 do Apple-y things on this keyboard. Not a lot I can do about that
unless I get into customising those in OS X itself. The Fkeys in OS X
are modifiable by a "Fn" key on some but not all Apple keyboards, but
this Logitech model doesn't have that.

WIth the benefit of hindsight my problem with iTerm was that the
developer(s) didn't provide access to old versions when new versions
were released, so you could easily get stuck with regressions in
behaviour.

What I have learned from that exercise is to squirrel old versions of
software downloads away; you never know when online access to those
versions might disappear for good. That also applies to software
downloads from Apple and probably other large software providers FWIW.

[Roger Ivie]

Post by Sampsa Laine

Post by JF Mezei
UKELELE is the app you want to create your own mapping. However, the
apple keyboard are missing the upper left key in the 6 keys above the
arrow keys. (the key is physically there, but rendered
inoperative/totally useless by lower level software)

Actually on mine it's "fn" which is quite useful for Mac stuff (i.e.
the volume/brightness buttons etc)..

I've fiddled with my Apple Aluminum keyboard a bit under Linux, and have
found that the "fn" key seems to be pretty dodgy; I'm not certain it's
the Mac software that's the problem here.

Also, the Eject key sends both the make and the break code when you
press it. And it doesn't auto-repeat.

[Steven Schweda]

Post by Sampsa Laine
Guys,
SInce USB LK keyboards cost an arm and a leg, I've decided to sort of build my own. Since I'm an OS X user I'll be using Terminal.app mostly for access to my VMS boxes and figured I'd get the full USB (with keypad) Mac keyboard (about 50 USD), remap the keys as closely as possible to an LK, and maybe print some tiny labels on what is what :)
If I manage to do this successfully, I'll let you know and post the Terminal.app key bindings for anyone else who might be interested.

[V***@SendSpamHere.ORG]

Guys,
SInce USB LK keyboards cost an arm and a leg, I've decided to sort of build=
my own. Since I'm an OS X user I'll be using Terminal.app mostly for acces=
s to my VMS boxes and figured I'd get the full USB (with keypad) Mac keybo=
ard (about 50 USD), remap the keys as closely as possible to an LK, and may=
be print some tiny labels on what is what :)
If I manage to do this successfully, I'll let you know and post the Termina=
l.app key bindings for anyone else who might be interested.

Sampsa, Terminal.app does not permit defining the numeric keypad key.

If you install iTerm or use xterm, you can define the numeric keys in OS X
with Xmodmap.

[Sampsa Laine]

Post by Sampsa Laine
Guys,
SInce USB LK keyboards cost an arm and a leg, I've decided to sort of build my own. Since I'm an OS X user I'll be using Terminal.app mostly for access to my VMS boxes and figured I'd get the full USB (with keypad) Mac keyboard (about 50 USD), remap the keys as closely as possible to an LK, and maybe print some tiny labels on what is what :)
If I manage to do this successfully, I'll let you know and post the Terminal.app key bindings for anyone else who might be interested.

Yup, Terminal.app is pretty limited, going to try this out with iTerm 2 this week. If it works out, I'll post the profile here.