Before using mscreen, FacetTerm or other multiple session software, you will need to know the following:

• Which terminal emulation will you be using?
• How many sessions will you need?

The rest of this document will address mscreen only.

Setup Procedures

1. Set the number of screen pages. In TERM or TinyTERM, this will be an option in your terminal emulation setup. For TinyTERM 4.x, go to the Edit menu and select Preferences.
2. Connect to the UNIX host as normal.
3. By default mscreen will check the file /etc/mscreencap for the terminal capabilities. If you are using a different file, set the MSCREENCAP environment variable to the file you will be using.
4. At a shell prompt, enter this command:
   

   mscreen -n 6

   The number can be less than 6, but it must not be less than the number of screen pages configured in step 1. TERM and TinyTERM support up to six screen pages.

   On some connections you will need to add the -t option to the above command line. This is particularly necessary for terminal devices that start with “ttyp”.

5. If all went well, you should see a screen similar to the following:
   

   mscreen rev VII
who is S-F7
help is S-F8
stop is S-F9
quit is S-F10
ttyp0 is S-F1
ttyp1 is S-F2
ttyp2 is S-F3
ttyp3 is S-F4
ttyp4 is S-F5
ttyp5 is S-F6

   The actual keys may be different, but some key assignment should be shown. You can then use the specified keys to switch between screens. Shift-F2 in the above example would take you to the second screen, ttyp1.

ANSI emulation may not have an entry in /etc/mscreencap. If this is the case, you can append the following entry to that file, or create a new file with the entry and set the MSCREENCAP environment variable to point to this file:

ansi|term63:\

:who,CSF7,\E[\:\
:help,CSF8,\E[],:\
:stop,CSF9,\E[\^,:\
:quit,CSF10,\E[_:\
:,CSF1,\E[w,\E[1z:\
:,CSF2,\E[x,\E[2z:\
:,CSF3,\E[y,\E[3z:\
:,CSF4,\E[z,\E[4z:\
:,CSF5,\E[@,\E[5z:\
:,CSF6,\E[[,\E[6z:

By default these entries will work if you are using the Ctrl+Shift key combinations. No other changes should be necessary.

If you wish to use the Alt key combinations for switching between sessions for exact console emulation, you will need to append the following entry to the /etc/mscreencap file instead:

ansi|term63:\

:who,A-F7,\E[7z,:\
:help,A-F8,\E[8z,:\
:stop,A-F9,\E[9z,:\
:quit,A-F10,\E[0z,:\
:,A-F1,\E[1z,\E[1z:\
:,A-F2,\E[2z,\E[2z:\
:,A-F3,\E[3z,\E[3z:\
:,A-F4,\E[4z,\E[4z:\
:,A-F5,\E[5z,\E[5z:\
:,A-F6,\E[6z,\E[6z:

You will also need to add the following lines to your TERM.RC or TT.RC file, or make the appropriate key mappings in other versions of TinyTERM:

setkey af1 "\e[1z"
setkey af2 "\e[2z"
setkey af3 "\e[3z"
setkey af4 "\e[4z"
setkey af5 "\e[5z"
setkey af6 "\e[6z"
setkey af7 "\e[7z"
setkey af8 "\e[8z"
setkey af9 "\e[9z"
setkey af10 "\e[0z"

If you experience problems with the ANSI entries working do one of the following:

1. Move the ANSI sequences to the beginning of the /etc/mscreencap file. There is a limitation on the size of the mscreencap file. Entries past this limit are simply ignored.
2. Set the MSCREENCAP environment variable to point to a file that only has the ANSI entries. For example:
   

   MSCREENCAP=/etc/mscreen.ans
export MSCREENCAP

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 9th, 2007 at 9:53 am and is filed under Terminal Emulation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.