Hi Terry, > but when I try to open nano in the initial boot shell, I get: > > error opening terminal: unknown
This used to be a common issue back when there were a wide variety of terminals, as in the CRTs and keyboards with a RS-232 cable running off to the computer. There's an environment variable TERM that should be set to describe your type of terminal. Programs use this to index a database that describes how to achieve effects, e.g. move the cursor. The database was a text file called /etc/termcap, terminal capabilities, but that got slow as it grew so it's now called terminfo and is a binary file per terminal type under /usr/share/terminfo. If that's the problem then `TERM=vt220 nano' should work. That sets the TERM environment variable just in the process that runs nano. What equipment are you using to view the `initial boot shell'? -- Cheers, Ralph. -- Next meeting: BEC, Bournemouth, Tuesday, 2019-04-02 20:00 Check to whom you are replying Meetings, mailing list, IRC, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread, don't hijack: mailto:dorset@mailman.lug.org.uk
