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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!seismo!mimsy!aplcen!osiris!jdia
From: jdia@osiris.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sources.d,comp.emacs
Subject: Re: when using emacs, get the keymap right!
Message-ID: <1183@osiris.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 17-Jun-87 09:52:48 EDT
Article-I.D.: osiris.1183
Posted: Wed Jun 17 09:52:48 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 19-Jun-87 05:12:54 EDT
References: <1283@cullvax.UUCP>
Organization: Johns Hopkins Hospital
Lines: 46
Xref: utgpu comp.sources.d:804 comp.emacs:1037

In article <1283@cullvax.UUCP>, drw@cullvax.UUCP (Dale Worley) writes:
> jdia@osiris.UUCP (Josh Diamond) writes:
> >     I won't even mention that most emacs'es don't understand the cursor
> > keys which exist on all but the most archaic terminals (and
> > Macintoshes). :-)
> 
> Maybe I'm missing something, but you can set up damn near any sequence
> of characters to invoke damn near any function in Emacs, so you just
> have to find out what all those PF and cursor keys transmit, and bind
> those strings to the functions you'd like to have.  Put this in your
> startup file:
> 
> (setq term (getenv "TERM"))
> (if (string-equal term "vt100")
> 	(progn
> 		(global-set-key "xxxx" 'blender-on-buffer)
> 		...))
...
> Dale

Shall we write code like this for every pfkey on every type of terminal?
Too expensive time-wise right?

Why not make emacs understand a database about terminal function keys.
It would have to be better than termcap/curses, as that only supports up
to 10 function keys in addition to cursor control keys (I think).  Why
wasn't emacs designed to at least understand cursor keys? They are already
in curses.

Also, many terminals, like the vt200, have in the area of 24 pfkeys, plus
a numeric keypad that can be put in "application" mode, plus dedicated keys
for Help, "Do", find, select, insert, remove, prev-screen, and next-screen.
In fact, the majority of newly designed terminals have similar keyboards.

BTW, Ingres uses its own version of termcap/curses so that it can figger
out how to use all of the function keys.  Hurray for RTI!

That's nuff...

					Josh / Spidey!

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