DOSEMU vga font

DOSEMU vga font

[Frank Cox]

I use LTSP to run terminals off of Fedora Linux servers and run DOSEMU on those
terminals.  (Some of you might be interested in my article about DOSEMU,
PowerBasic/DOS and LTSP: http://www.melvilletheatre.net/articles )

When I start DOSEMU on a terminal, I get this message:

QUOTE:
You do not have the DOSEMU vga font installed and are running
   remote X. You need to install the vga font on your _local_ Xserver.
   Look at the readme for details. For now we start with an fixed font,
   which does not display all national characters correctly.
   ... be warned
END OF QUOTE

That message doesn't appear to affect anything, and the DOSEMU window doesn't
look any different than it does when I run it directly on the server.

It has never been clear to me how to get rid of this error and since it never
affected or changed anything I haven't given it much thought.  However, now
that I'm playing with DOSEMU 1.4.0, it might be a good time to deal with this
error and get rid of it.

How and where do I add that missing font to keep DOSEMU happy when it's running
on a terminal?

-- 
MELVILLE THEATRE ~ Melville Sask ~ http://www.melvilletheatre.com

DOSEMU vga font

[Frank Cox]

Once again the spam filtering on this mailing list appears to have eaten my
post.

I'll try re-wording it a bit to see if I can get it through.

(Again, does anyone know how to go about getting my address whitelisted so this
won't keep happening?)

I use LTSP to run terminals off of Fedora Linux servers and run DOSEMU on those
terminals. 

When I start DOSEMU on a terminal, I get this message:  (the error message
states that I don't have the vga font installed and are running remote X.  I
won't post it verbatim because that appears to be what caused the spam filter to
not post my previous message about compiling dosemu from the src.rpm.)

That message doesn't appear to affect anything, and the DOSEMU window doesn't
look any different than it does when I run it directly on the server.

It has never been clear to me how to get rid of this error and since it never
affected or changed anything I haven't given it much thought.  However, now
that I'm playing with DOSEMU 1.4.0, it might be a good time to deal with this
error and get rid of it.

How and where do I add that missing font to keep DOSEMU happy when it's running
on a terminal?

-- 
MELVILLE THEATRE ~ Melville Sask ~ http://www.melvilletheatre.com

Re: DOSEMU vga font

[Julius Schwartzenberg]

Frank Cox wrote:
> It has never been clear to me how to get rid of this error and since it never
> affected or changed anything I haven't given it much thought.  However, now
> that I'm playing with DOSEMU 1.4.0, it might be a good time to deal with this
> error and get rid of it.
> 
> How and where do I add that missing font to keep DOSEMU happy when it's running
> on a terminal?
> 

I don't know exactly what distro LTSP is based on but for most distros, 
there is a package to install the required fonts for Dosemu.

Otherwise a guide on installing fonts in X.org will probably help. I 
guess the VGA fonts shouldn't be hard to find in the Dosemu source dir. 
I always did this by just installing the appropriate package myself though.

Re: DOSEMU vga font

[Bart Oldeman]

On 6/2/07, Frank Cox <theatre@melvilletheatre.com> wrote:
> Once again the spam filtering on this mailing list appears to have eaten my
> post.

I got your message twice actually.

> (Again, does anyone know how to go about getting my address whitelisted so this
> won't keep happening?)

I don't think that's possible... but there is information on what is
permitted and what not on
http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
and
http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-taboos.txt

> It has never been clear to me how to get rid of this error and since it never
> affected or changed anything I haven't given it much thought.  However, now
> that I'm playing with DOSEMU 1.4.0, it might be a good time to deal with this
> error and get rid of it.

The message comes from the dosemu script (/usr/bin/dosemu). It's on my
todo list for 1.4.1 to get rid of it, it's harmless, wrong by default,
and at the wrong place. dosemu.bin can complain if it can't find the
font though.

Essentially, if you don't set $_X_font, or use the default "" setting,
then a bitmap font is used; X fonts aren't necessary for that.

If you set it to "vga" (as was the default in 1.2.1 and earlier), and
vga is not available, then the message is relevant. However the script
isn't smart enough to know all that.

Bart

Re: DOSEMU vga font

[Frank Cox]

On Sat, 2 Jun 2007 20:02:24 -0400
"Bart Oldeman" <bartoldeman@users.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> I got your message twice actually.

So did I, eventually.  Instead of being lost I guess my first message just
wandered in the darkness for a while.    I'll wait longer before giving up the
next time.

> The message comes from the dosemu script (/usr/bin/dosemu). It's on my
> todo list for 1.4.1 to get rid of it, it's harmless, wrong by default,
> and at the wrong place. dosemu.bin can complain if it can't find the
> font though.
> 
> Essentially, if you don't set $_X_font, or use the default "" setting,
> then a bitmap font is used; X fonts aren't necessary for that.
> 
> If you set it to "vga" (as was the default in 1.2.1 and earlier), and
> vga is not available, then the message is relevant. However the script
> isn't smart enough to know all that.

Ah... That is the best explanation that I have ever seen regarding this
situation.  Thank you ever so much for describing what's going in so clearly -
I sincerely appreciate it.

Incidentally, it has been brought to my attention (ahem.. several times) that
the link that I gave to my PowerBasic/DOS under DOSEMU article in my previous
message is wrong.  The correct link to the article is:

http://www.melvilletheatre.com/articles

Apologies to everyone who tried to access the article from the previous link.

Perhaps I should also take this opportunity to thank you, Bart Oldeman, for all
of your work on DOSEMU.

DOSEMU is truly a marvellous piece of software.  It allows me to continue to
enjoy programming in "obsolete languages" (like Turbo C, which I was just
playing with again the other day, and PowerBasic, as mentioned above) and run
programs like WordPerfect, one of several programs that there is just no real
substitute for in modern software.

DOSEMU and Vice (C64 emulator) are just like old times, indeed.

Thank you, Bart.  Your efforts are greatly appreciated here.


-- 
MELVILLE THEATRE ~ Melville Sask ~ http://www.melvilletheatre.com