ANTterm

9.1 About ANTterm

ANTterm is a terminal for logging on to text-based services, using either a telnet or a remote login (rlogin) connection.

Telnet/terminal emulation

Telnet allows you to connect to other computers as if you were using a text-based terminal, without being on the same network or dialling them up directly. Examples of the sort of service you might use this for are:

• Online conferencing systems such as CIX
• The French Minitel service:
• Chat services and online games.

Once you are connected to a telnet-based service you use commands to operate it. This usually involves typing in commands or choosing options from a list to move from screen to screen.

ANTterm provides the following facilities:

• VT220 and VT102 terminal emulation
• Support for downloadable fonts
• Links with the Hotlist application for ease of use
• Configurable terminal features
• Line editor mode. This is particularly useful for slow connections or any connection where you want to be able to type and edit text easily before sending it.
• Sessions can be saved as text or data.

rlogin connections

Remote login connections are more usually used between UNIX computers and by system administrators. Although the ANT Internet Suite supports this type of connection, in most cases a standard Telnet connection is more appropriate and provides all the necessary facilities.

9.2 Working with ANTterm

Loading ANTterm

To load ANTterm:

1. Double-click on the ANT terminal icon in the Internet Suite panel.
2. The ANT terminal will load with its icon on the righthand side of the icon bar ready for use.

Opening a session

To connect to a server as a terminal you will need to know the name or IP address of the machine you want to connect to. In some cases you also need to add a port number after the machine name.

• If you prefer to edit text before sending it (for example, in a chat service), or know that you have a slow connection or service, use the Setup dialogue to put ANTterm into line editor mode.

To open a session:

1 Click on the ANT terminal icon on the icon bar.

The New session dialogue will be displayed.

2 Type in the name or IP address of the computer to which you wish to connect, your username if relevant and the port number (if required) or choose it from the pop-up Hotlist menu:

• If you have an account you can enter your details as follows:

username@hostname

username:password@hostname

• Some services may require you to enter a port number. The Telnet port number, 43, is used by default. Do this in the following format, separating the machine name and the port with a comma:

game.playing.com,6000

• You can also enter addresses in URL format, for example:

telnet://minitel.fr

telnet://username@hostname

telnet://username:password@hostname

3 Click Connect.

4 A connection window will be opened.

Messages and instructions from the computer to which you are connected will appear in the ANTterm window.

5 Log in using your username and password as requested inside the session window.

Using the hotlist

You can store frequently accessed addresses in the hotlist. This enables you to access them either from the ANTterm program or from the Hotlist application.

To add an address to the hotlist:

1. Enter the address in the Open session dialogue
2. Click the pop-up button at the right of the dialogue.
3. Choose Add item from the Hotlist popup menu.
4. The address will appear in the hotlist within ANTterm and also in the Hotlist application main list of links (see chapter 10).

To delete an entry from the hotlist:

1. Display the Open session dialogue box and click the pop-up list.
2. Choose the entry you want to remove from the Hotlist.
3. When the entry appears in the Open session dialogue, display the pop-up list and choose Remove item.
4. The item will be removed from the Hotlist.

Viewing session information

You can view information about the session by clicking Menu inside the window and choosing Info:

Saving sessions

To save the characters exchanged during a session to a file:

1. Click Menu inside the ANTterm window and display the Spool menu.
2. Choose the required option:
3. Choose Open to save a text file.
4. Tick the Raw data option to save data including non-displayed characters, then choose Open. The file icon will change to a data icon.
5. Drag the file icon to a filer window. Your session will be saved in this file.
6. When you wish to stop adding data to the file, choose Close from the Spool menu.

Selecting text and URLs

You may select text from the terminal window, or URLs to use in another ANT Internet Suite program.

1 Drag to select the area you want.

• Drag using the Adjust button to select an area and immediately display the Selection menu.

2 Click menu inside the Terminal window and display the Selection menu.

• Choose Save from the Selection menu to save the selection as a file.
• Choose Launch URL to launch the program relevant to any URL contained in the selection, e.g. Marcel for mailto: or Fresco for http: URLs.
• Choose Send to enter the selected text in the terminal window as if you had typed it. This can be useful as a copy/paste option.
• Choose Clear to clear the selection. If you used Adjust-Drag, this option will not appear but the selection will be cleared automatically when you click elsewhere in the ANTterm window.

Telnet options

The Telnet menu allows you to send certain commands automatically during a Telnet session. Choose Telnet from the ANTterm menu, then click on one of the options on the menu to send the command:

• Interrupt process sends a command to stop the current process or task. The precise effect will depend on the server but it is usually equivalent to cancelling a task.
• Abort output sends a command to abort output from the server. The precise effect will depend on the server but it is usually equivalent to cancelling a task.
• Are you there? makes the server send a brief text message in reply, so that you can test that the connection is still active at times when a server is slow or busy.

Quitting a session

Once you have finished working with the host terminal, you should:

1. Enter the required command (for example logout or exit to quit or disconnect from the service.
2. When you are disconnected from the service, the title bar of the terminal window will change to read:
3. Session finished. Please close the window.
4. Close the terminal window. If you configured the session window to close on disconnection, using the Terminal configuration dialogue box (see below), the window will close automatically.

9.3 Configuring the terminal

The terminal software can emulate a number of different terminals which have been used over the years. While there are many standards, and most systems are not particularly choosy about the type of terminal which connects to them, some systems rely on a particular type of terminal being used.

You can therefore configure the terminal to more closely match the requirements of the system you are connecting to.

• Note that settings are saved for each login separately. They are not applied globally to all logins. For example, if you save settings while connected to minitel.fr, those settings will only be used next time you connect to minitel.fr and will not be used when you connect to a different computer.
• If you configure the terminal incorrectly you may get inconsistent results or the terminal might not work at all. If you do not know that a setting is required it is often better not to specify it. If there are any problems, contact the administrator of the system to which you wish to connect for full setup information.

To set terminal options:

1. Click Menu inside the Terminal window.
2. Choose Setup from the ANTterm menu, then Terminal.
3. The Terminal configuration dialogue will be displayed:
4. Choose the required options for your terminal. In most cases the default settings will be adequate but some systems may require special settings.

• Wrap is selected by default and linewraps text sent and received within the terminal window.
• Flash enables flashing text emulation.
• Reverse video reverses the colours used, so you can display black text on a white background.
• Newline mode makes the Return key (and the Enter key on the keypad when not in application keypad mode) send a CR, LF sequence as opposed to the usual CR sequence.
• Swap Delete/Backspace swaps the functions of the Backspace and Delete keys, in line with the requirements of some systems.
• Application cursors makes the cursor keys send the DEC Application cursor key sequences as opposed to the normal ANSI cursor key sequences. This option is usually set/cleared by a command from the remote computer.
• Application keypad makes the keypad keys send the DEC keypad sequences: some programs (especially on VAXes) will then use the keypad as a function-key pad. This option is usually set/cleared by a command from the remote computer.
• Block cursor displays a flashing block instead of an underline cursor.
• VT102 ID forces the terminal to act as a VT102-type terminal: by default it acts as a VT220 terminal.
• Close window on connection close closes the ANTterm window automatically when you end a session by quitting the host.
• Line editor puts the terminal into line editor mode. This places an editing line at the bottom of the terminal window.

5. Enter a text string for Answerback if required. Answerback defines a string to be sent in response to an ENQ command (ASCII 5) from the remote host. It is rarely used nowadays.

6. When you have chosen the options you want, click OK to use them.

To save settings made in the Terminal window dialogue or Terminal configuration dialogue, choose Save setup.

To set window size:

1. Choose Size from the Setup menu. The Terminal window size dialogue box will be displayed:
2. Enter the Window size required. The default size is 80 ¥ 24: changes made will be used for rlogin sessions, but telnet sessions will usually ignore any entry here.
3. Enter the Scrollback size in number of lines. The default number of lines is 24, but you may wish to increase this for either type of session.
4. This option lets you keep the specified number of lines which have scrolled past the top of the window, so that you can scroll back up and review them.
5. Click OK.
6. To save settings made in the Terminal window dialogue or Terminal configuration dialogue, choose Save setup.