[Info-vax] PC/VT Keyboarrd Mapping

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2016-06-25 01:26:25 +0000, David Froble said:

> Why is it that whatever you use is great ... and whatever I use should die?

There are no new LK keyboards.  There are fewer keyboards with keypads, too.

Unfortunately what you're using — the keypad-based application and 
keypad-based editors — is dying out, David.  (I too became quite fond 
of keypad tools, but then the GUI won for most folks and most users, 
and the command-line tools went to the subset keyboard or — for those 
that really needed it — to the PC-compatible keyboard.)    The 
added-function-button PC keyboards are becoming scarce, too.

But if you're using EDT now and are not likely to migrate to a 
keyboard-based editor, try LSEDIT.  It has the same EDT keypad, it's 
much faster than EDT, and COMPILE /REVIEW is well worth the effort of 
the migration from EDT.   The pattern searches are very handy, too.  
Yes, the LSEDIT command line is different.   LSEDIT can be run without 
the keypad, as can EDT.  But I find the LSEDIT command line easier to 
deal with.

Downside: EDT, LSEDIT and EVE/TPU are OpenVMS-specific, and don't exist 
on other platforms.  (Yes, you can find some open source for EDT, but 
then you're back in the keypad quagmire.)

Among the more common text editors...  Learning vim or emacs here will 
take many years to retrain your fingers and to learn the new commands.  
     The usual analog to EDT on other systems is the pico / nano 
editor, and that's keyboard based.   No keypad is required.  But that's 
where the command line is headed.  For application development, the GUI 
and IDEs are what most folks are increasingly using.  The available 
IDEs on other platforms well past what LSEDIT can provide, and 
massively far past the edit-compile-link sequence common on OpenVMS.

But for OpenVMS software and tools — whether you're at VSI or an 
end-user, and whether the software is OpenVMS itself or some 
application package — the DEC VT LK-series keyboard is no longer 
manufactured.  If that doesn't provide a convincing argument around 
where hardware and dependent software is inevitably headed, I'm not 
sure what will.  Even if the LK production starts up again, that still 
adds hardware dependencies for all of the users involved in the 
LK-dependent project.

OpenVMS apps either need to forget about the VMS-layout LK and/or 
provide an alternative to the keypad, or somebody start up LK 
production.   And then sell enough of those new LK keyboards to matter, 
and that seems unlikely to succeed given pricing and commoditization.


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