This directory contains documentation for Kermit 95:

• Change Log
• What's New in Kermit 95 v3.0
• SSH Readme (slowly becoming obsolete)
• The User Manual
• Quick History of Open Source Kermit 95
• Supported Control Sequences
• Build instructions
  • Supported Compilers
  • Building for Windows with Visual C++ or Open Watcom
  • Building for OS/2 with Open Watcom
  • Building for Windows with MinGW
  • Optional Dependencies
  • Source code index
  • Build Flags

The manual directory contains the Kermit 95 User Manual. This was originally a printed booklet and a collection of text files until Kermit 95 v1.1.17 of June 1998 when it was converted into HTML 1.0 format and updated with each release.

With the cancellation of the Kermit Project in 2011, Manning Publications assigned the copyright back to Columbia University and in March 2011 Frank da Cruz updated it for the web and put it online. In July 2024 Frank gave permission to add the manual to the git repo and sent through the version that was on kermitproject.org at the time. This has now been revised for the new open-source Kermit 95.

To make keeping it up-to-date, the various version numbers, release dates, and last modified dates scattered around the place have been updated with tags to allow them to be updated with a script. That script is mkdocs.bat/mkdocs.ksc/mkdocs.rex.

The manual can be built in one of two ways:

• For the web: HTML files end in .html, and index.html is the main page of the manual. This is just like the online version.
• For distribution with Kermit 95. HTML files end in .htm for better compatibility with vintage computers, index.html is an index to the offline documentation shipped with Kermit 95, and kermit95.html is the main page of the manual. Can optionally be built with insecure (http:// rather than https://) links to kermitproject.org for better compatibility with older browsers

To build the manual you must:

• Be in the K95 build environment (have run setenv.bat)
• Have built the Kermit 95 distribution (run mkdist.bat)
• Have built the Kermit 95 distribution for A CPU architecture compatible with the computer you're building it on (if you're on an x86 machine, you've got to build Kermit 95 for x86 or x86-64 in order to build the manual) as building the manual involves running the freshly built version of Kermit 95.
• Kermit 95 must be built with REXX support, and must include the regutil and rexxre external function libraries.

The reason for the above requirements is that Kermit 95 is used to build the manual, and version numbers and build dates from the version of Kermit 95 being used will be injected into the manual.

To build the manual for the web (note the output path must end with a \):

mkdocs.bat /W

To build the manual for distribution with K95:

mkdocs.bat

To build the manual for distribution with K95 on vintage computers (fewer https links):

mkdocs.bat /I

Regardless of how you build it, the manual will end up in the dist directory, under \docs\manual

Kermit 95 includes extensive documentation on the various control sequences it supports in its ANSI terminal emulations, similar in nature to xterms excellent ctlseqs document. This documentation includes, where possible, references to original terminal documentation for more information on the various control sequences implemented

The documentation also includes references for many control sequences not implemented by Kermit 95. This allows you to easily see not only what is supported, but also what is not.

This documentation lives in two XML files:

• ctlseqs.xml covers implemented (and not implemented) control sequences for
• keyb.xml covers the default keymaps for the terminals discussed in ctlseqs.xml

These documents must be converted to HTML using a REXX-enabled build of Kermit 95 and the following scripts:

• xml2doc.rexx processes the XML files into HTML
• xml2doc.ksc is a convenience wrapper script for running xml2doc.rexx

The REXX script cannot be run from a stand-alone REXX interpreter as it relies on calling in to Kermit 95 to get version information and other details.

To build the HTML control sequences documentation, either run mkdocs.bat, or do something like the following:

k95.exe -Y -# 94 -C "take xml2doc.ksc true {preliminary.html} 0, exit"
k95.exe -Y -# 94 -C "take xml2doc.ksc true {preliminary.html} 0 keyb.xml, exit"

This will result in the following files:

• ctlseqs.html - the main document
• outline.html - an outline of the main document
• keyb.html - covers keymaps
• tt-ctlseqs.html - a table showing which control sequences and parameters are enabled for each terminal type
• term-ctlseqs.html - a table of all control sequences that ctlseqs.xml knows about from a selection of terminals whether Kermit 95 implements them or not
• todo.html - a table of control sequences K95 does not currently implement but probably should for improved compatibility.

The HTML conversion of this documentation is available on the web for the code currently on the main branch here: https://davidrg.github.io/ckwin/dev/ctlseqs.html