Terminal program for PB622/623

[neil_swann80]

Previous changes made...

• Tweaks to scale pbterm to the screen correctly on newer devices
  (Formerly the top few lines of the screen were unused and once the text reached the bottom of the screen you'd lose a line or two, with some text wrapping around to the top of the screen.)
• Set the HOME key to toggle between portrait and landscape.
• Fixed long-press of PREV button. Long-press of PREV and NEXT buttons decrease and increase text size.

Most recent changes made...

• Increased the size of the top-left and top-right (invisible) on-screen corner buttons to make them easier to press. Top-left quits pbterm, top-right is a recording/log toggle.
• Merged the pbterm.kbd (keyboard layout) and pbterm.cfg (user editable config file) into the binary. They will now be extracted to your device automatically if not already present.
• Modified the scroll limiting; allows the output text to be scrolled all the way to the top of the screen, rather than bottom limited. Essentially you can raise the last outputted text above the height of the on-screen keyboard (rather than it covering the text) which I find useful when working with files with user unfriendly names.

[nhedgehog]

Tested it on Inkpad X (IP1040). All is working well. Appreciate the modified scroll limiting.
Thanks again!

[diegoocampo]

Hi!

I just tried that latest version of PBterm and it is crashing for me in a PocketBook InkPad Color 3. I am running the latest firmware from PocketBook.

Did someone try this in my model or maybe in a Color 2 (which I believe is exactly the same model with just different screen)?

[neil_swann80]

Originally Posted by diegoocampo

Hi!

I just tried that latest version of PBterm and it is crashing for me in a PocketBook InkPad Color 3. I am running the latest firmware from PocketBook.

Did someone try this in my model or maybe in a Color 2 (which I believe is exactly the same model with just different screen)?

Does the original work for you?

[diegoocampo]

Originally Posted by neil_swann80

Does the original work for you?

Thanks for the quick reply! I just tried that original version and it is also crashing. No error messages or anything, it just doesn't open.

[neil_swann80]

Perhaps the inkpad Colour 3 is sufficiently different enough in architecture that pbterm isn't compatible. Hopefully someone else with a similar device can confirm.

What is the program listed as in your device app menu?

[diegoocampo]

Originally Posted by neil_swann80

What is the program listed as in your device app menu?

It shows as "@pbterm", see attached image.

Someone with an InkPad Color 2 should also be able to validate this.
Thanks.

[sk83]

Originally Posted by neil_swann80

Perhaps the inkpad Colour 3 is sufficiently different enough in architecture that pbterm isn't compatible. Hopefully someone else with a similar device can confirm.

Can confirm. I experience the same issue on my Color 3 (FW 6.8.2480). Jailbreak also doesn't work.

I do notice that my Color 3 has kernel version 4.9.56, versus version 3.10.65 on my Era (FW 6.8.2568).

[orontee]

@neil_swann80 Could you publish the sources on Github or service alike?

[neil_swann80]

Originally Posted by orontee

@neil_swann80 Could you publish the sources on Github or service alike?

Here's the source I modified: https://github.com/Alastor27/pbterm

When I'm next home I'll create a fork of this and add my changes.

[x3oo]

Is it possible to run emacs or vi in this terminal?

[neil_swann80]

Originally Posted by x3oo

Is it possible to run emacs or vi in this terminal?

I haven't tried. Without a physical keyboard they would be extremely cumbersome. Seems like SSH from a computer would be a far better option.

[rkomar]

Originally Posted by neil_swann80

I haven't tried. Without a physical keyboard they would be extremely cumbersome. Seems like SSH from a computer would be a far better option.

The available software keyboards are also missing some of the keys you need to run vi. I ended up creating my own keyboard layout (I think the escape key was the most important addition) back when I was editting in poterm I think it was. I'm not sure if you can even still add and use your own keyboard layouts, but vi won't work well with a software keyboard if it is missing the escape and ctrl keys.