Removing direct references to /usr in the Makefile, for nix.
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<h1>Terminal Mixer</h1>
<p>This program can start processes inside a pseudo-terminal, which can be
accessed through a Unix socket, TCP or even raw ethernet (using the ethernet
protocol 0xCACA). The programs can be linked to the current terminal, or
they can be unlinked like in <em>nohup</em>. But even in this latter case you
can connect to them using the mentioned protocols.</p>
<p><em>tm</em> can also start programs as if they communicate through pipes
instead of terminals, and this can be quite useful for remote-controlling
applications.</p>
<p>More than one client can connect to the served pseudo-terminal, either using
<em>tm</em> as a client or <em>telnet</em> for TCP. You can choose if they
are only allowed to read, or they can also contribute on input.</p>
<h2>Download</h2>
<p>Download the latest version (GPL 2+ licensed):
<a href="tm-0.4.1.tar.gz">tm-0.4.1.tar.gz</a> - v0.4.1 - <a
href="ChangeLog">ChangeLog</a></p>
<p>Look at the
<a href="/~viric/cgi-bin/hgwebdir.cgi/tm">version repository</a> if you are
interested in its development. If you can send any bug report, please
do that at the mail address at the bottom of the page. I'd like this
program to have as few bugs as possible, sure!</p>
<h2>What can you do with it? Examples of use</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="#share">Share a terminal remotely</a>
<li><a href="#ether">Have an assured way of accessing a host, even if it has no IP address</a>
<li><a href="#mplayer">Remote control for mplayer</a>
<li><a href="#telnet">Transfer files through telnet</a>
<li><a href="#log">Access to a part of an execution log, on demand</a>
</ul>
<h3><a name="share"></a>Share a terminal remotely</h3>
Start <em>vim</em> cooperatively, using:
<pre>
tm -N 2 -p 3000 -t -x -w vim
</pre>
<p>Two [-N 2] users will be able to telnet to the port 3000 [-p 3000], and get
the same <em>vim</em> terminal [-t] interface as you. They will be able
to use vim [-w], not only look at it.
The size of their xterms [-x] will be set accordingly to the size of your
terminal. A nice feature of xterm!</p>
<blockquote>Attention! <em>vim</em> programs the vt100/xterm input/output codes at start.
If the clients don't receive those codes, they won't be able to use the Cursor
Keys effectively, for example. In that case, you may start a bash in tm, and
when the clients are connected, start vim.</blockquote>
<h3><a name="ether"></a>Have an assured way of accessing a host, even if it has no IP address</h3>
<p>Start a remote <em>bash</em> putting this in your start scripts:</p>
<pre>
ifconfig eth0 up
tm -e eth0 -n -w bash &
</pre>
<p>Then you can connect to it using another computer (as root), typing
the MAC address of the serving host:</p>
<pre>
tm -e eth0 -c 00:14:85:16:B2:32
</pre>
<p>And you will have a non-terminal bash answering your requests. Don't
<em>exit</em> from it, because the <em>tm</em> server will end.</p>
<h3><a name="mplayer"></a>Remote control for mplayer</h3>
<p>Start a <a href="http://www.mplayerhq.hu/">mplayer</a> allowing remote
commands with:</p>
<pre>
tm -w mplayer -slave voice_recording.mp3
</pre>
<p>Then you can send orders as simple as these:</p>
<pre>
echo pause | tm
</pre>
<p>Make your xbindkeys to map to these commands, and you can have a good
control of your music playing.
In fact I mapped <em>pause</em> to F1, and <em>go backwards 5 seconds</em>
to F2, and I use this for transcription of voice recordings.</p>
<h3><a name="telnet"></a>Transfer files through telnet</h3>
<p>If you run a telnet client inside <em>tm</em>, you can use a <em>tm</em> client
to send uuencoded streams. You can look at a
<a href="http://www.youterm.com/?view=Player&video=tools/tm-telnetfile">Youterm
podcast</a> for that.</p>
<h3><a name="log"></a>Access to a part of an execution log, on demand</h3>
<p>Imagine you want to run the program XXX, which does a lot of debug
output in stdout. Even without running it through tm,
you will be able to access the logs <strong>only</strong> when
you connect to it.</p>
<pre>
XXX | tm cat > /tmp/total_log.txt
</pre>
<p>You can redirect to /dev/null or use <em>tm</em>'s -n [nohup] if you
don't want
to store all the debug info. In any case, you can run a simple
<kbd>tm</kbd> command with no parameters, and you will be seeing
the debug info since the connection. Close <em>tm</em> (Control-C) and
you will not see the info until a new connection is made.</p>
<h2>Manual</h2>
<p>Here you have a copy of the help for v0.4:</p>
<pre>
tm v0.4 - terminal mixer, Copyright (C) 2007 Lluis Batlle i Rossell
usage: ./tm [opts] [appcommand] [param1] [param2] ...
If you give _appcommand_, it starts the application and
serves it through a Unix socket on $TM_SOCKET or /tmp/tm-socket.UID,
unless '-p' is used.
Without _appcomand_, starts a the Unix socket client.
options:
-h Show help.
-P Run the child as connected to a pipe (default).
-t Run the child as connected to a terminal (raw mode in client).
-n Unlink the program from the terminal (as 'nohup').
-N MAX Serve at most MAX sockets for each transport (1 default).
-w The remote clients can write to the application.
-C The remote clients end will close app's stdin.
-p NUM Listen to tcp port NUM for 'telnet', and not listen to any
Unix socket.
-E Echo remote input to the server terminal.
-e dev Also serve/connect using raw ethernet, device 'dev'.
-c adr Connect to address (MAC if eth).
-x Send xterm's resize control string to clients.
</pre>
<h2>Thanks</h2>
<ul>
<li>To Pancake, who gave a spark for the general idea of this program,
based on an initial <a href="../stdinmix">stdinmix</a>
<li>To Raúl Salinas, for its support.
<li>To the useful, although sometimes uncomfortable, UNIX interface.
<li>To GNU, an ugly but working and helpful ol' UNIX implementation.
<li>I took some bits from
<a href="http://freshmeat.net/projects/cec/">Coraid Ethernet Console</a>
(BSD license). <a
href="http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9/">Plan 9</a> version at
<kbd>/n/sources/contrib/quanstro/src/cec/</kbd> - Thanks to Erik Quanstrom.
</ul>
<address>Author:
<a href="http://vicerveza.homeunix.net/~viric/index.html.en">Lluís
Batlle i Rossell</a>,
viric_at_vicerveza_dot_homeunix_dot_net</address>
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