On Tue, 10 Feb 2004, Greg Troxel wrote:

> I think it is a bug that:
>
>    ptyInitialErase is not set to true by default,
>    and
>    backarrowKeyIsErase is not set to true by default,

You could broach the subject on tech-x11. I can say, from
reviewing the CVS history, it's been the way it is for a very long
time, accusations of "recent changes" notwithstanding. I also seem
to recall that xterm doesn't emulate a VT100 in any sense, that it
emulates something known as an "ANSI" terminal. No doubt you might
find out more, and more accurate, details with a web search engine.

> because of not only the DEL-is-the-traditional-erase-character reason,
> but because non-PC systems (RSX-11/M, NetBSD on a serial line, etc.)
> expect DEL as the erase character.

You've got to balance that against the many years of (recent?)
tradition, and the fact that all programs and platforms that do the
right thing with a terminal type of "xterm" would suddenly break. At
least NetBSD systems can be configured to work properly from an xterm
"terminal". [Maybe we need an "xterm" type in "/etc/gettytab"?]

Frederick