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- COMMENTS ON RUNNING KERMIT 3.0 FOR THE IBM PC UNDER MICROSOFT WINDOWS
-
- Kermit 2.32/A will successfully run in a window with Microsoft Windows and
- will accept cut and pasted information. Scripts and phone dialing instructions
- are cases of cut and paste replacing the keyboard. Use the PIFEDIT program to
- construct a .PIF file for Kermit, following the guidelines below.
-
- Program name: KERMIT.EXE or whatever is the name of the Kermit file.
- Program title: MS-DOS Kermit 3.0
- Program parameters: Leave blank since this becomes a command line
- Initial directory: Directory, if any, to CD to when starting Kermit
- Memory Requirements: 128 KB Required, 160 KB Desired
- Directly Modifies: Clear all boxes (pretend Kermit is very good)
- Program Switch: Check the Text box
- Screen Exchange: Check the Graphics/Text box
- Close Window on exit: Check the box
-
- Comments. Although Kermit does direct writes to the screen it does so in a
- "TopView aware" manner. One may check or leave empty the COM1 or COM2 boxes
- even though Kermit does directly modify the serial port. Kermit will block
- (XOFF) if left running as an icon, but it will run smoothly while sharing the
- screen with other tasks. Communications throughput is limited by Windows'
- character drawing speed. Graphics are done as if you had a monochrome
- adapter. Screen dumps ( ^] F or Control End) will be of Kermit's underlying
- full screen. In summary, tell Windows that Kermit is exceptionally well
- behaved.
-
- If you check the modifies memory box or some of the other boxes (or if you
- don't have a KERMIT.PIF file at all), then Kermit will take over the whole
- screen and Windows will become inactive, and Windows features will no longer
- work. But Kermit will run much faster, and graphics will work normally.
-
- ------------------------------
-
- Date: Thu, 13 Apr 1989 23:00:26 EDT
- From: "Joe R. Doupnik" <jrd@watsun.cc.columbia.edu>
- Subject: MS Kermit and MS Windows
-
- I just ran MS Kermit 2.32/A and the prerelease of Kermit 3.0 under Windows
- 2.03 and the 386 rendition of 2.03, both with no problems. I made Kermit a
- client talking to a remote server and launched a large file GET. Then I
- brought up various Windows programs such as Clock, PIFedit, Write, etc and
- played about. The transfer proceeded as smoothly as Windows permits (I could
- watch the Server's screen). Baud rate was 9600 and the throughput under
- regular 2.03 was around 7000 and under 386 about 2800 (more games being done
- and the Windows scheduler is different, 8800 with sliding windows and less
- mucking about).
-
- The PIF files had these boxes checked:
-
- Regular Windows 2.03: Memory req'd 150KB, desired 150KB
- Program switch Text
- Screen switch Text
- Close window on exit
- (No COM boxes checked, pretend v. good behavior)
-
- Windows/386: Memory req'd 150KB, desired 150KB
- Screen mode Full Screen Background (also ok as just Backgnd)
- Close window on exit
-
-
- I pushed poor Kermit into the background, plopped other windows on it, resized
- its window, and generally behaved obnoxously. The only time Kermit stopped was
- when it was forced to become an icon under regular Windows; that is normal for
- regular Windows. I checked the Full Screen box in 386 mode to see what happens:
- nothing untoward at all. Windows is a little awkward in that situation because
- the user has to type ALT-ESCape to regain attention of the master control
- program and hence invoke other tasks. Kermit ran ok even when it did not have
- the "input focus" (ownership of keyboard and cursor) or was invisible.
-
- If a second program grabs the serial port then naturally Kermit will halt.
- Interpreted BASIC and older MS Compiled BASIC programs do such grabbing, and
- forget to return interrupts. Some "integrated" systems programs also have
- communications options which might grab the serial port. If the user has a bus
- mouse then all bets are off because of the well known major problems related to
- their high interrupt rates. If the second program has mouse support and that
- code attempts to find a serial mouse by probing the serial ports then the baud
- rate could be upset.
-
- If people have problems running MS-Kermit under Windows, find out what
- "second" programs they were running, the kind of MS Windows, kind of mouse
- (serial, bus, mfr). And of course watch out for Terminate-and-Stay-Resident
- programs that might be interfering with Kermit's interrupts, and for the old
- Basic programs that let the serial port interrupt point to never-never land.
-
- End of File MSVIBM.PIF
-