This virtual HP-IL device emulates a terminal (display and keyboard). It can be used as a display device without using a keyboard by all HP-IL controllers. The keyboard emulation is supported for the HP-75 and the HP-71B (see below).
HP-IL configuration:
| Accessory ID | 0x3E |
| Default Address | 8 |
| Device ID | PILTERM |
The display supports all escape sequences which are specified on page 328 of the HP-71B reference manual. In addition the emulator supports the escape sequences ESC S (scroll one line up), ESC T (scroll line down>, ESC U (display next page) and ESC V (display previous page). Selected text can be copied to the system clipboard.
The display supports four character sets:
Note: although it was possible to map nearly all characters of the HP calculators to Unicode, some very special characters may not be displayed correctly due to missing characters in the system fonts.
The Enable IDY frames option in the pyILPER configuration must be enabled if pyILPER is connected to the PIL-BOX. You need at least the firmware version 1.6 installed on the PIL-Box as well.
Set the character set and keyboard type to HP-71 in the Tab configuration menu (see below).
Install the KEYBOARD LEX and the PILTERM Basic program which are provided in the LIF disk image file PILIMAGE.DAT which is part of the pyILPER package.
The function Copy PILIMAGE.DAT to workdir in the
Utilities menu copies the file PILIMAGE.DAT from the pyILPER
software directory to the current pyILPER working directory.
Mount PILIMAGE.DAT to a virtual drive and copy the
KEYBOARD LEX file and the PILTERM Basic program to the HP-71B.
Enter RUN PILTERM from the HP-71B keyboard and make
the terminal tab of pyILPER visible. You should now see a blinking
cursor. Click into terminal window. Now you can enter characters that
are sent to the HP-71B as keyboard input.
If the keyboard hangs press the ATTN key twice at the HP-71 and
rerun the PILTERM program from the HP-71 keyboard.
If you need to reconfigure the loop simply run the PILTERM
program from the terminal window again.
Keyboard mappings:
| PC keyboard | HP-71 key |
|---|---|
| F1 | ATTN |
| F2 | RUN |
| F3 | CMDS |
| F4 | SST |
| F5 | -LINE |
| F6 | LC |
| Up | Up |
| Down | Down |
| Left | Left |
| Right | Right |
| Back | BACK |
| Shift up | Jump Begin |
| Shift down | Jump End |
| Shift left | Cursor to begin of line |
| Shift right | Cursor to end of line |
| Ctrl down | Next catalog |
| Insert | I/R |
| Delete | -CHAR |
To enter any character which is not available on the PC keyboard you can use the ALTnnn input method (see below). It is not possible to enter characters with a character code > 127.
You need the HP-75 IO-ROM to use the keyboard emulation. In addition you have
to install the PILHP75 basic program which included in the LIF disk image file PILIMAGE.DAT. See the chapter above how to mount this file as a virtual drive.
Set the character set and keyboard type to HP-75 in the Tab configuration menu (see below).
Copy the file to the HP-75 and enter run 'pilhp75'. Proceed as specified in the chapter above.
Keyboard mappings:
| PC keyboard | HP-75 key |
|---|---|
| F1 | ATTN |
| F2 | TIME |
| F3 | APPT |
| F4 | EDIT |
| F5 | FET |
| Shift F5 | Last error |
| Ctrl F5 | Last input |
| F6 | CLR |
| Ctrl F6 | Reset Display |
| F7 | Literalize |
| Shift F7 | Literalize and underscore |
| F8 | RUN |
For all other input to the HP-75 use the keystrokes as specified in the user manual. Nearly all key combinations should work. There is no emulation for the HP-5 LOCK key.
To enter any character below character code 127 use the appropriate keystroke or the ALTnnn input method (see below). To enter characters with code > 127 use the prefix CTL I/R which is Shift F7 on the PC keyboard.
Limitations:
The keystrokes CTRL-Spacebar to Ctrl-Z are not supported because they interfere much with window managers. If you need any character from this code range use the method described below.
To enter a numeric character value hold down the ALT
key and enter a 3 digit numeric value (000 - 127).
For MAC Users the following shortcuts are available:
| Shortcut | Character or function |
|---|---|
| ALT-5 | [ |
| ALT-6 | ] |
| ALT-8 | { |
| ALT-9 | } |
| ALT-L | @ |
| ALT-I | toggle insert/replace |
Beyond that the Meta key must be used for the Ctrl key combinations on macOS.
You can paste keyboard input from the system clipboard. Use this feature with care.
The ALT-A to ALT-Z key combinations with the exception of ALT-I and ALT-L (see above) can be used as user defined shortcuts. These shortcuts can be specified in the file menu.
Note: Some key combinations might be reserved for the window manager and thus are not forwarded to the pyILPER application. In this case try to disable or redefine the affected key combination in the window manager.
The keystrokes PageUp and PageDown scroll the window to the previous and next window respectively. These keystrokes do not send any data to the controller. Instead they insert the corresponding Escape sequences in the display command buffer immediately.
Device enabled checkbox: If checked then the virtual HP-IL terminal device is available on the loop. Please mind to reconfigure the loop each time this box has been checked or unchecked.