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From: mark@cbhydra.uucp
Newsgroups: net.info-terms
Subject: Re: A real ANSI X3.64 Terminal: Beehive ATL-008
Message-ID: <106@cbhydra.uucp>
Date: Wed, 4-Jul-84 14:41:29 EDT
Article-I.D.: cbhydra.106
Posted: Wed Jul  4 14:41:29 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 5-Jul-84 00:38:43 EDT
References: <2146@tekig.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus
Lines: 23

$1700 for a terminal whose only claim to fame is that it's ANSI 3.64
compatible isn't exactly impressive.  But then I don't recall Beehive
ever having terminals that were competitively priced.

The ANSI X3.64 standard isn't a total solution to the problem of
terminal compatibility, for a number of reasons.  It specifies a
fairly large set of capabilities that nobody is going to implement
on a CRT, like italics, having both bold and dim, etc.  So it's
considered OK to subset it.  But there is no standard subset, and
if you pick a reasonable subset there will be lots of terminals that
are missing something important (e.g. the vt100 doesn't have insert
or delete line or character.)  It also doesn't specify the screen size
(or a way to find it out), which is important to all screen oriented
programs.  And it doesn't specify details like what to do at the right
margin, or whether cursor addressing is screen relative or memory
relative.

However, there are lots of inexpensive terminals that implement all
the important features.  In the $500 range are the Zenith z19 and
the Wyse (and I'm probably forgetting a few important ones.)

If you have specific gripes about some aspect of 3.64 that you can't
find in terminals claiming 3.64 compatibility, tell us about them.