Does anyone have a live VT52?

From: Paul Williams <celigne_at_celigne.freeserve.co.uk>
Date: Tue Apr 9 16:33:50 2002

"Carlini, Antonio" wrote:
>
> My quick check of the the VT102 and VT220 manuals does not show
> "ESC /" as a recognised emulated VT52 sequence. The VT100 manual
> makes it quite clear how to react to random ESCape sequences. It is
> pretty silent on VT52 emulation mode.

Exactly. I suspect that later terminals ignored all of "ESC / B" (in
fact, "/" could be any character from column 2, SP -> "/") because the
terminal would be impervious to a host that incorrectly echoed back the
ident response.

> I suspect the VSRM is too (if we still have one in the office, I'll
> check tomorrow).

Ooh, you tease! Any chance of that document escaping altogether?

> The only way to determine whether the VT1xx is a faithful VT52
> emulator is to see what a real VT52 does. (Or read the schematics,
> which I believe are online).

They are online, but the schematics don't list the contents of the ROM
containing the actual "program" executed by the VT52. The maintenance
manual gives a nice description of the instruction set, but no listing.

Of course, deliberate decisions are made about how faithful a later
model would be when emulating an earlier one. After all, a VT220 in
VT100 mode doesn't emulate a VT100; it emulates a VT102 (or VT100 plus
Level 2 Editing Extension, if you like).

Cheers,
Paul
Received on Tue Apr 09 2002 - 16:33:50 BST