> On Oct 1, 2018, at 1:55 PM, Paul Koning <paulkon...@comcast.net> wrote: > >> On Oct 1, 2018, at 2:46 PM, Ethan Dicks via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org> >> wrote: >> >> On Thu, Sep 6, 2018 at 2:16 PM, Tapley, Mark via cctalk >>> ...I have to say my favorite VT-100-alike is a Rainbow. One box (plus >>> monitor plus the dreaded LK-201), three functions in the collection: VT-100 >>> emulation (not perfect but not bad), CPM-80/86 (is that one or two >>> functions?), MS-DOS 3.11b. >> >> I have only recently learned of the built-in VT100 emulation. I'm >> curious how it's "not perfect". > > I don't know that particular one. But a possible answer would be: because > the VT100 had a bunch of strange corner cases that were not documented and > not necessarily well understood. > > DEC created an internal standard for terminal behavior; that specification > was extremely detailed and very well written. It became the functional > specification for the VT200 series. I used it to write the terminal emulator > for RSTS on the Pro. It was understood at the time that this spec was close > to VT100 behavior (apart from 8 bit characters instead of 7) but not exactly > that, and deliberately so. > > Similar things have happened in other places. There is DDCMP, and "DMC > compatibility mode" which is best described as "DDCMP with certain bugs". It > hard to find a reasonable description of the latter. If you want to do > DDCMP, you're best off implementing the spec (which is easy) but if you do, > it won't work 100% with the "high speed" variant of the DMC-11. > > paul
I can’t remember the exact VT-100 / Rainbow differences. I do remember seeing a description (usenet-post kind of thing, not an official document) that detailed them, and deciding the Rainbow emulation was “good enough” for my purposes. If I can find that document (later this week) I’ll try to post or re-post it, but I’m submerged by $work at the moment. If someone else comes up with it before me, I’ll be glad! - Mark