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Unit 2: RedHat Linux Basics

5. Window Manager Capplet: Gnome is not dependent on any one window manager; notes
therefore the Window Manager capplet allows you to select which window manager you
wish to use. Your current window manager will be labeled Current. It only shows Gnome-
compliant window managers; if you want to use other window managers, you have to tell
Window Manager capplet about them. If you wish to add a new window manager to the
main list you may press the Add button. This will launch the Add New Window Manager
dialog.

Did u know? The Document Handlers section of the Gnome Control Center allows you to
change the way certain file types and functions are viewed, edited or manipulated.

2.4 using terminal emulator

Since a PC has a screen and keyboard (as does a terminal) but also has much more computing
power, it’s easy to use some of this computing power to make the PC computer behave like a text
terminal. This is one type of terminal emulation. Another type of terminal emulation is where
you set up a real terminal to emulate another brand/model of terminal. To do this you select the
emulation you want (called “personality” in Wyse jargon) from the terminal’s set-up menu. This
section is about the first type of emulation: emulating a terminal on a PC.

In emulation, one of the serial ports of the computer will be used to connect the emulated terminal
to another computer, either with a direct cable connection from serial port to serial port, or via a
modem. Emulation provides more that just a terminal since the PC doing the emulation can also
do other tasks at the same time it’s emulating a terminal. For example, kermit or zmodem may be
run on the PC to enable transfer of files over the serial line (and possibly over the phone line via
a modem) to the other computer that you are connected to. The emulation needs only to be run
on one of the virtual consoles of the PC, leaving the other virtual consoles available for using the
PC in command-line-interface.
Much emulation software is available for use under the MS Windows OS. See Make a non-Linux
PC a terminal This can be used to connect a Windows PC to a Linux PC (as a Text-Terminal). Most
Linux free software can only emulate a VT100, VT102, or VT100/ANSI. If you find out about any
others, let me know. Since most PC’s have color monitors while VT100 and VT102 were designed
for a monochrome monitor, the emulation usually adds color capabilities (including a choice of
colors). Sometimes the emulation is not 100% perfect but this usually causes few problems. For
using a Mac computer to emulate a terminal see the mini-howto: Mac-Terminal.

2.4.1 Don’t try to use TERM Variable for Emulation

Some have erroneously thought that they could create an emulator at a Linux console (monitor)
by setting the environment variable TERM to the type of terminal they would like to emulate.
This does not work. The value of TERM only tells an application program what terminal you
are using. This way it doesn’t need to interactively ask you this question. If you’re at a Linux PC
monitor (command line interface) it’s a terminal of type “Linux” and your can’t change this. So
you must set TERM to “Linux”.
If you set it to something else you are fibbing to application programs. As a result they will
incorrectly interpret certain escape sequences from the console resulting in a corrupted interface.
Since the Linux console behaves almost like a vt100 terminal, it could still work almost OK if you
falsely claimed it was a vt100 (or some other terminal which is something like a vt100). It may
seeming work OK most of the time but once in a while will make a mistake when editing or the
like.

LoveLy professionaL university 45