Which is it--fP or Anzio?

[Bob Rasmussen]

On Sun, 11 Sep 2005, Fairlight wrote:

> >From inside the gravity well of a singularity, Bob Rasmussen shouted:
> >
> > Edit:Advanced Options:Security:Prompt to save settings.
>
> Thanks.  That works.  Incidentally...is it just me, or is there no general
> setup wizard per se, where you can have default settings and then just
> modify the hostname or phone number?  I've set one up by hand, including
> all the colour setups, etc., and fire that up, change what I need, and save
> out a different definition file.  It works, but it's a bit clunky.  Now
> that I know the config files are in ASCII, perhaps I'll just copy end edit
> though.

For the vast majority of Anzio users (well over 100,000), startup and
configuration consists of answering TWO questions: terminal type and host
name. This results usually in immediate success. If they want to fine-tune
things later, they can do so at any point. But it would be silly to ask
them a long series of questions at startup, for which most would have no
strong preference.

>
> > Am I right that it boiled down to bad termcap files on the host end?
>
> For the half-duplex, yes.  I still don't know why it's getting the idea
> it has to re-set to full-duplex when it's already there.  I used Chad's
> supplied entries for regular and fP termcaps (which were supposed to be
> known-good) and it -still- thinks the duplex is being set from somewhere.
> Since there's no longer any indication that I ever go to half-duplex, I'm
> just going to disable the save changes box and have done.  I don't care
> past that.
>
> Now if only I could get rid of the extra space reserved for the status
> bar or ruler when I turn both off...  It's very odd seeing a terminal that
> stops a line short of the window boundary, as if you have an undersized
> terminal setting for ROWS.  I haven't worked with anything that acted like
> that since about 1991 on a Z-29.  Just went through the advanced options
> as well, and nothing's jumping out at me, as nothing did in the main
> options before.  When I disable something, I kinda don't expect it to keep
> reserving the room for it.

There are two ways I could approach a question like this. I *could* give
you the history of the evolution of Anzio that led to this point. But I
won't.

The real reason that it works this way is that it hasn't been a sufficient
issue among the universe of users. I can't recall ONE other person
complaining about this. And believe me, we get plenty of feedback on our
products, and maintain a long to-do list, even on a mature product with
over 20 years of development. So it's fairly safe to assume, when you
encounter such a cosmetic item in a mature product, that either a) you are
using the product in a way that is different from most users, or b) that
you are picky. I'll guess a). Most people leave either the status bar or
the gauge showing. The rest don't care.

Nevertheless, your complaint has been duly noted, and will probably be
fixed by the next point release. Unless you want to place an order for 100
copies, contingent on this being fixed. In that case, I'll do it tomorrow.

:-)

Regards,
....Bob Rasmussen,   President,   Rasmussen Software, Inc.

personal e-mail: ras at anzio.com
 company e-mail: rsi at anzio.com
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