9TERM(1) 9TERM(1)
NAME
9term, label, wloc - terminal emulator
SYNOPSIS
9term [ -s ] [ -p9font fontfile ] [ -unix ] [ -9 ] [ -ls ] [ -ut ] [
-label label ] [ -high highwater ] [ -low lowwater ] [ -9wm ] [ -e cmd
... ]
label name
wloc
DESCRIPTION
9term is a terminal emulator for the X Window System. It provides a
terminal window similar to an 81/2 window.
Commands
The 9term command starts a new instance of a terminal window.
The -s option creates a scrolling window; by default scrolling is
inhibited. A +s option forces the window not to scroll.
The -unix option starts 9term in Unix mode; normally it starts in Plan
9 mode (see below). The -9 option starts 9term in Plan 9 mode.
The fontfile argument to the -p9font option names a fontfile used to
display text, both in 9term's menus and on the window. It also
establishes the environment variable font with this value, so any
programs running in its windows may use the same font. If fontfile
cannot be used as a valid libXg font file (see font(4)), then 9term
will attempt to use an X font by the same name. If -p9font is not
given, 9term imports a default font from the underlying graphics
server. If that fails 9term will attempt to use the default X font,
see graphics(3).
The -ls option make the window a login window (prepends a `-' to cmd).
The option +ls attempt to do the opposite. The default is not to
create a login window.
The -ut option causes 9term to place an entry in the /etc/utmp file.
A corresponding +ut option prevents 9term from placing an entry in
/etc/utmp. The default is not to create a utmp entry.
The -label command gives the new 9term window the initial label of
label. The default label is 9term.
The -e option tells 9term to run the command cmd in the window with
the following arguments. This must be the final option on the command
line. If no command is specified, 9term runs the program specified by
the environment variable SHELL in the window, if this is unset, then
9term runs sh(1) in the window.
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9TERM(1) 9TERM(1)
The -high and -low options set the maximum and minimum amount of
characters kept by 9term. At any one time the actual number of
characters stored may slightly exceed the highwater mark.
The -9wm option allows 9term to work more harmoniously with 9wm when
started before the window manager may have completed its
initialisation, such as in a user's .xsession file. It causes 9term
to refrain from placing a border around the text content of the window
and instead allows the window manager this task.
The label command changes a window's identifying name.
The wloc command prints the coordinates of the instance of 9term in
which it is executed and is used to construct a geometry argument for
X programs. It relies on the environment variable WINDOWID which
9term places in the environment in a manner similar to xterm(1).
Window control
Each window behaves as a separate terminal with at least one process
associated with it. When a window is created, a new process (usually
a shell; see sh(1), rc(1), and es(1)) is established and bound to the
window as a process group leader of a new process group. Initially,
each window acts as a simple terminal that displays character text;
the standard input and output of its processes are attached to
/dev/tty.
Text windows
Characters typed on the keyboard or written to /dev/tty collect in the
window to form a long, continuous document.
There is always some selected text, a contiguous string marked on the
screen by reversing its colour. If the selected text is a null
string, it is indicated by a hairline cursor between two characters.
The selected text may be edited by mousing and typing. Text is
selected by pointing and clicking button 1 to make a null-string
selection, or by pointing, then sweeping with button 1 depressed.
Text may also be selected by double-clicking: just inside a matched
delimiter-pair with one of {[(<`'" on the left and }])>`'" on the
right, it selects all text within the pair; at the beginning or end of
a line, it selects the line; within or at the edge of an alphanumeric
word, it selects the word.
Characters typed on the keyboard replace the selected text; if this
text is not empty, it is placed in a snarf buffer common to all
windows but distinct from that of sam(1).
The Output Point
Programs access the text in the window at a single point maintained
automatically by 9term. The output point is the location in the text
where the next character written by a program to /dev/tty will appear;
afterwards, the output point is the null string beyond the new
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9TERM(1) 9TERM(1)
character. The output point is also the location in the text of the
next character that will be read (directly from the text in the
window, not from an intervening buffer) by a program from /dev/tty.
When such a read will occur is, however, mostly under control of 9term
and the user.
In general there is text in the window after the output point, usually
placed there by typing but occasionally by the editing operations
described below. A pending read of /dev/tty will block until the text
after the output point contains a newline, whereupon the read may
acquire the text, up to and including the newline, since 9term will
not send characters until there is a newline after the output point.
After the read, as described above, the output point will be at the
beginning of the next line of text. In normal circumstances,
therefore, typed text is delivered to programs a line at a time.
Changes made by typing or editing before the text is read will be seen
by the program reading it. Lines are sent when a newline is typed by
the user, thus there may only be at most a single line of text after
the output point waiting to be sent.
Even when there are newlines in the output text, 9term will not honour
reads if the window is in hold mode, which is indicated by a white
cursor and border. The ESC character toggles hold mode. Some
programs, such as mail(1), may benefit from hold mode to simplify the
editing of multi-line text; type ESC when done to allow mail to read
the text. Hold mode is disabled when the terminal is in cbreak/raw
mode, for example, when using rlogin. When the terminal is in this
mode, changes to the last line will not be `seen' by the program
running in the window since characters typed are sent immediately.
Terminal modes
An EOT character (control-D) behaves exactly like newline except that
it is not delivered to a program when read. Thus on an empty line an
EOT serves to deliver an end-of-file indication: the read will return
zero characters. Like newlines, unread EOTs may be successfully
edited out of the text. The BS character (control-H) erases the
character before the selected text. The ETB character (control-W)
erases any nonalphanumeric characters, then the alphanumeric word just
before the selected text. `Alphanumeric' here means non-blanks and
non-punctuation. The NAK character (control-U) erases the text after
the output point, and not yet read by a program, but not more than one
line. All these characters are typed on the keyboard and hence
replace the selected text; for example, typing a BS with a word
selected places the word in the snarf buffer, removes it from the
screen, and erases the character before the word.
The characters listed above are the default characters for the Plan 9
mode of 9term. The initial value of this set may be changed with the
p9TtyModes X resource and may be useful for keyboards which have no
backspace key (such as DEC keyboards). Such a change is static for
the life of a 9term. A corresponding resource, ttyModes, may be used
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9TERM(1) 9TERM(1)
to set the initial Unix mode characters. Such characters may be
altered over the life of a 9term.
Text may be moved vertically within the window. A scroll bar on the
left of the window shows in its clear portion what fragment of the
total output text is visible on the screen, and in its gray part what
is above or below view; it measures characters, not lines. Mousing
inside the scroll bar moves text: clicking button 1 with the mouse
pointing inside the scroll bar brings the line at the top of the
window to the cursor's vertical location; button 3 takes the line at
the cursor to the top of the window; button 2, treating the scroll bar
as a ruler, jumps to the indicated portion of the stored text. Also,
a VIEW key (possibly with a different label; see keyboard(4)) scrolls
forward half a window. A REVIEW key (scroll back half a window) may
also be supported.
The DEL character sends an interrupt signal to all processes in the
window's process group. Alone among characters, the DEL and VIEW keys
do not snarf the selected text.
Normally written output to a window does not block when the text
reaches the end of the screen. In this respect 9term differs from an
81/2 window. A button 2 menu item toggles scrolling.
Cutting, Pasting and Snarfing Text
Other editing operations are selected from a menu on button 2. The
cut operation deletes the selected text from the screen and puts it in
the snarf buffer; snarf copies the selected text to the buffer without
deleting it; paste replaces the selected text with the contents of the
buffer; and send copies the snarf buffer to just after the output
point, adding a final newline if missing. Mark/extend is useful for
making a selection larger than will fit on the screen. Mark indicates
one extreme of the selection while extend selects the text from the
current mark to the include the current selection. Paste will
sometimes and send will always place text after the output point; the
text so placed will behave exactly as described above. Therefore when
pasting text containing newlines after the output point, it may be
prudent to turn on hold mode first. Scroll/noscroll toggles scroll
mode.
Button 3 menu items are used to search forwards and backwards in the
window, and access the hold and view features of 9term when running in
Unix mode. Selecting fwd (bkwd) searches forward (backward) in the
window from the current cursor position for the next (previous)
occurrence of the currently selected text. If no text is currently
selected then 9term searches the window for the string currently in
the snarf buffer. Selecting suspend is equivalent to typing the hold
key. When the terminal is in hold mode this menu item will change to
resume. Selecting view or review is equivalent to pressing the VIEW
or REVIEW key. The last button 3 menu item toggles between Plan 9 and
Unix modes.
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9TERM(1) 9TERM(1)
X DEFAULTS
LibXg understands all of the resources mentioned in graphics(3)
including p9font, composeMod, and scrollForwardR, as well as
scroll (class Scroll)
Specifies whether or not the window should scroll. The
default is ``false.''
login (class Login)
Specifies whether or not the shell to be run in the window
should be started as a login shell. The default is ``false.''
utmp (class Utmp)
Specifies whether or not 9term should try to record the user's
terminal in /etc/utmp. The default is ``false.''
label (class Label)
Specifies an initial label for the window that may be used by
a window manager when displaying this application. The
default is ``9term.''
kbdMode (class KbdMode)
Specifies the initial label keyboard mode. The default is
``plan9.''
ttyModes (class TtyModes)
Specifies a string containing terminal setting keywords and
the characters to which they may be bound. These are the
characters initially to be used in Unix mode. Allowable
keywords include: intr, quit, erase, kill, eof, eol, eol2,
swtch, start, stop, susp, dsusp, rprnt, flush, weras, and
lnext. Control characters may be specified as ^char (e.g. ^c
or ^u) and ^? may be used to indicate DELETE. This is very
useful for overriding the default terminal settings without
having to do a stty every time a 9term is started.
p9TtyModes (class P9TtyModes)
Specifies a string of the same format as above indicating the
characters to be used in Plan 9 mode.
highwater (class Highwater)
Specifies the maximum number of characters of output 9term
should save. At any one time 9term may slightly exceed this
limit. The default is 50 000.
lowwater (class Lowwater)
Specifies the low water mark for 9term. 9term truncates the
saved output to this many characters when the number of saved
characters exceeds the high water mark. The default is
40 000.
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9wm (class 9Wm)
Specifies whether or not 9term should refrain from placing a
border around the the text inside its window. The default is
``false.''
beep (class Beep)
Specifies the modes for which 9term should sound an audible
bell when confronted with the BEL character (control-G).
Permissible values are ``plan9'' and ``unix'' corresponding to
the two keyboard modes. Both may be specified. The default
is ``none''.
FILES
/lib/font/bit/* font directories
SEE ALSO
sh(1), rc(1), es(1), sam(1), 9wm(1), mail(1), graphics(3), frame(3),
layer(3), text(3), keyboard(4).
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