Mouse interface for text mc via console telnet

[Ferdi Louw]

Hi Pavel,

Thanx for your friendly and useful answers - much appreciated (almost as 
much as I appreciate your work on mc! :-)

On 4 Sep 2001, at 17:19, Pavel Roskin wrote:
> Mouse support on the Linux console is implemented using gpm library. This
> library reads mouse events from a UNIX socket /dev/gpmctl using gpm own
> protocol.  I don't tring it's worth the trouble to emulate it.
> 
> Mouse support on xterm actually works remotely if you run telnet or ssh in
> xterm.  I always wanted an emulator for Windows that would emulate xterm
> closely enough to support xterm mouse.

Our package of emulators on Windows does not include xterm.  But I think 
we should investigate the posibility of producing one.  Since our bread-and-
butter depends on selling the package, we can not use GPL code to write 
an xterm.  (You're welcome to try our linux console - just ask.)

> However, there are three important limitations.  They are likely to be
> removed in the future, but they exist in all versions of MC including
> 4.5.55:
> 
> 1) The terminal name on the remote side must begin with "xterm" or be
> equal to "dtterm".
> 
> 2) This cannot be overridden even by the "-x" option.
> 
> 3) The protocol must be exactly the one used by xterm.  The sequences are
> hardcoded - they are not taken from terminfo.
> 
> In other words, to support xterm mouse, xterm should be emulated quite
> closely, but this requirement may be relaxed in the future versions of MC.

These limitations do not sound too hard!?
 
> You could search for documents about xterm mouse reporting, but I just
> want to suggest you one.  Get rxvt-2.6.3 from
> ftp://ftp.rxvt.org/pub/rxvt/rxvt-2.6.3.tar.gz and look for "mouse" in
> doc/rxvtRef.txt

Thanx - I'll get it.
 
> > How can I send the mouse clicks to the linux box? My emulator allows me
> > to add scripted functions.  Currently I translate mouse clicks into certain
> > keystrokes depending on position and content on the screen.
> 
> At least implement xterm mouse reporting without the ability to disable
> it.  Even that will be safer.

Yes - I guess that is the direction I should be looking at.
My idea was that I send an escape sequence from the terminal to mc 
giving the type of mouse-click and the position.  Something like:
"M-mouse 1 down;03;56".  It would then work from many different 
terminals, provided they can translate their mouse-clicks to the required 
string.

> If we only could make all already existing code in MC work, without any
> new stuff!

Yes - first things first - but it seems one never gets there  :-/

Greetings
Ferdi