Celestial Software

1) Options-Properties-VT Options. You select "Enter Sends: CR/LF", then click on a different tab at the top of the dialog, and then click back on the "VT Options" tab, Absolute Telnet resets "Enter Sends:" to "CR".

2) When sending files using ZModem (Transfer-Send-ZModem), Absolute Telnet appears to transmit the file at blazing speed. I mean, it takes about 2 seconds for the progress indicator to fill up, when it should take more like 20 seconds for the file I'm sending. But then, once the progress indicator fills up, Absolute Telnet continues to send and starts filling the progress indicator a second time. Eventually the transfer aborts with errors, and on the receiving computer there is only a portion of the file I tried to send. I'm guessing that the ZModem implementation in Absolute Telnet isn't waiting for the proper acknowledgements or something. YModem works fine. I have not tried XModem. It would also be really nice to have Kermit, especially since Kermit is better suited for Internet file transfers than any of the *Modem protocols.

3) This is not so much a bug as a supreme annoyance. Whenever I run Absolute Telnet it attempts to check for newer versions. Although it's designed to perform this check only once a week, the problem is that I have a dialup connection, and Absolute Telnet causes the modem to dial. Then, because it's a dialup connection, Absolute Telnet apparently times out while trying to check for updates, so it doesn't clear the flag that tells it that it has performed the check this week. So the result is that every time I run the program it dials the modem, fails to check for updates, and doesn't clear this flag. Extremely annoying!!! Can you please make this check an option or at the very least tell me if there's a change I can make to the registry to inhibit the check?

[ January 28, 2003, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: Brian T. Pence ]

I neglected to mention that the problems I'm having with ZModem are over an RS-232 connection, not a TCP/IP connection.

1) AbsoluteTelnet tries to intelligently set this switch when you change the type of connection from one to another, setting 'CR/LF' for Telnet, SSH1, and SSH2 but only 'CR' for COM and Dialup. User changes to the switch should take precidence over the default setting. Unfortunately, there appears to be some unwanted interaction in the dialogs where just switching back to the 'connection' tab will cause this switch to revert to it's default state. Is this what you're experiencing??? I'll look at this in more detail in the code.... For now, set the flag the way you want it and click 'ok' to get out of the property sheets. The flag will stick, but if you go back to the 'connection' property page, it'll revert back again.

2) Zmodem does not have the tight handshaking that xmodem and ymodem do. Zmodem will send as fast as it can and no data comes from the receiver unless there's a problem. If a transmission error occurs, the receiver notifies the sender, who backs up the the appropriate spot and begins again at full speed. Now, on the sender side, the file transfer can seem to go unusually fast at first because it is filling up the outgoing data buffers first, before any data is actually physically sent. In fact, if your file is small enough, the sender might send the entire contents of the file before one byte even leaves your machine. There's no send/ack/send/ack/send/ack handshaking going on that throttles speed like in xmodem and ymodem.

To diagnose your particular problem, I'd need to know the following:

1. Does this happen for every file or just some?
2. The version of Absolute you're running
3. Connection type (Telnet, COM, SSH1, SSH2)
4. Client OS
5. Server OS
6. Server zmodem software type and version
7. Perhaps even a copy of the file you're trying to send (if possible), or a similar file that exhibits the same behavior

3) I recognize the problem here, but have yet to form an adequate solution. A temporary solution would be to connect to the internet before you run Absolute so the check can succeed. Then, you won't have to do that again for at least a week.

Dave, I fixed the CR/LF toggle. I disabled the smart switching altogether. Most people should know when and if this setting is needed. That's what I get for trying to be smart, I suppose.

Thanks for the feedback!

Sorry, the link....

http://www.celestialsoftware.net/telnet/beta_software.html

Thank you for the fix. I think I can wait for an official update of the program. I don't want to have to worry about getting an update for a time-limited beta version before it times out. Been there.

Dave,

Can you answer the zmodem questions??? I'm still interested in getting that issue resolved as well.

Brian