16 Dec 94, Gary Chambers writes to Jon Guthrie:

 >>> stumped on how I should go about writing to the local screen and the
 >>> comm port simultaneously, and how to get input from remote.

 >> My door library writes everything twice...

 > Thanks, Jon.  I will keep this in mind.

There isn't much you can do BUT write everything twice in that situation.  This
is especially true if you want the local display to be different from the
remote display, which is typical.

 >> Input is really a piece of cake
 >> except for the fact that you have to have some sort of
 >> timeout to recognize ESCapes separate from escape sequences.

 > I am unfamiliar with this.  Can you elaborate, or provide some source
 > snippets?  Thanks again!

If you are writing a program that deals with a remote terminal, you are
likely to have two conflicting requirements.  You probably would like it to
interpret things like the "arrow keys" properly and you probably
would like to interpret single ESCape characters as single ESCape
characters.  The conflict occurs because the "arrows keys" most
likely send sequences that begin with ESCape characters.  So, if you
receive an ESCape, you don't know if it's a single ESCape or the beginning
of one of the sequences triggered by an arrow key.

What I do is put a timeout on each character and check the next character
received to see if it's a '['.  If the call to read the next character
times out or if it isn't a '[' then it's a lone ESCape.  If I get a '['
without timing out, then it may be an "arrow key."  (Then again,
it might not.)

Is any of this clear?

You probably want to use

- Jon

--- GoldED/2 2.42.G0214