19 Apr
2005
19 Apr
'05
1:11 p.m.
Hello fellow ClassicCmp'ers,
Would any of you happen to have the load image for the VT1300 X terminal?
VT1300 is actually a diskless VAXstation 3100 (SCSI controller daughterboard
also omitted) that instead of running VMS or Ultrix netboots a special
image that turns it into the VT1300 X terminal. I'm looking for that
image.
I have the boot images for the VXT 2000 X terminal (VXT and VXT EX software
V2.1) which also support VS3100/VT1300 (I guess it was officially supported
as a software upgrade from VT1300 to VXT 2000), but VXT software on VS3100/
VT1300 does not actually work too well. The VS3100/VT1300 is just a
standard VAXstation while the VXT 2000 has some special hardware and console
ROM adaptations to perform its special function. VS3100/VT1300 has just the
minimal NVRAM used by the console ROM, whereas VXT 2000 has a much larger
NVRAM that can store an entire X resource file. The VXT software is
designed to use that NVRAM and works poorly when it is not available, as is
the case on VS3100/VT1300.
The result is that when you run VXT software on a VS3100/VT1300 and don't
have an InfoServer, there is no way to save customizations to the terminal's
configuration, not even the most essential settings like the DNS servers
(which it does NOT take from the BOOTP server's response), which makes the
terminal practically unusable. On paper VXT software supports three types
of saved settings (resource files): NVRAM, InfoServer-based and host-based.
NVRAM is not an option because it does not exist on VS3100/VT1300,
InfoServer-based is not an option when you don't have an InfoServer, and
apparently for it to fetch a host-based resource file via TFTP it has to
first get the path to it from NVRAM, which is a chicken and egg problem
when you don't have NVRAM.
There is also the much more basic VXT EX software (just an X terminal
without local clients) and it apparently does not use resource files like
the full VXT does, but it still wants to save some things in NVRAM:
again the DNS server (which it stupidly does not take from BOOTP), the
host to connect (XDMCP) to, and the TFTP font path. It's a royal pain
to reenter all that stuff every time, and not just on power cycles, but
every time you log out you have to reenter it before you can log in again
because it restarts and clears everything after XDM ends the session.
I'm hoping to have a better lot with VT1300 software if I can find it,
since it's a bare-bones X server just like VXT EX, but actually designed
for VS3100/VT1300 hardware without NVRAM. From what I've read about it,
it always XDMCPs to the boot host (the one that replied to BOOTP) instead
of doing the song and dance that VXT EX does.
So, does anyone have a copy of the VXT EX load image? TIA for any help,
MS