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@(#)tip.1 8.4 (Berkeley) 4/18/94
.Dd May 26, 2025 .Dt TIP 1 .Os .Sh NAME .Nm tip , .Nm cu .Nd serial terminal emulator .Sh SYNOPSIS .Nm .Op Fl v .Fl Ns Ns Ar speed .Ar system-name .Nm .Op Fl v .Fl Ns Ns Ar speed .Ar phone-number .Nm cu .Op Ar options .Ar phone-number .Nm cu .Op Ar options .Dq Ar dir .Nm cu .Fl -help .Sh DESCRIPTION .Nm and .Nm cu are used to connect to another system over a serial link. In the era before modern networks, they were typically used to connect to a modem in order to dial in to a remote host. They are now frequently used for tasks such as attaching to the serial console of another machine for administrative or debugging purposes.
p The following option is available for .Nm : l -tag -width 4n t Fl v Set verbose mode. .El
p The following options are available for .Nm cu : l -tag -width 4n t Fl a Ar acu Set the ACU port. t Fl c Ar number Call this number. t Fl E Ar char Use this escape character. t Fl e Use even parity. t Fl F Ar flow Set flow control to .Ar hard , .Ar soft , or .Ar none . t Fl f Use no flow control. t Fl h Echo characters locally (half-duplex mode). t Fl l Ar line Specify the line to use. Either of the forms like
a tty00 or
a /dev/tty00 are permitted. t Fl n No escape (disable tilde). t Fl o Use odd parity. t Fl P Ar parity Set parity to .Ar even , .Ar odd , or .Ar none . By default, no parity is used. t Fl p Ar acu Set the ACU port. t Fl s Ar speed Set the speed of the connection. Defaults to 9600. t Fl t Connect via a hard-wired connection to a host on a dial-up line. .El
p If .Ar speed is specified it will override any baudrate specified in the system description being used.
p If neither .Ar speed nor .Ar system-name are specified, .Ar system-name will be set to the value of the .Ev HOST environment variable.
p If .Ar speed is specified but .Ar system-name is not, .Ar system-name will be set to a value of .Dq tip with .Ar speed appended. e.g.\& c tip -1200 will set .Ar system-name to .Dq tip1200 .
p The optional .Dq dir argument is for Taylor implementation compatibility, indicating a direct connection. (This is how .Nm cu behaves by default, regardless.)
p Typed characters are normally transmitted directly to the remote machine (which does the echoing as well). A tilde (`~') appearing as the first character of a line is an escape signal; the following are recognized: l -tag -width flag t Ic ~^D No or Ic ~ . Drop the connection and exit (you may still be logged in on the remote machine). t Ic ~c Op Ar name Change directory to .Ar name (no argument implies change to your home directory). t Ic ~! Escape to a shell (exiting the shell will return you to tip). t Ic ~> Copy file from local to remote. .Nm prompts for the name of a local file to transmit. t Ic ~< Copy file from remote to local. .Nm prompts first for the name of the file to be sent, then for a command to be executed on the remote machine. t Ic ~p Ar from Op Ar to Send a file to a remote x host. The put command causes the remote x system to run the command string ``cat > 'to''', while .Nm sends it the ``from'' file. If the ``to'' file isn't specified the ``from'' file name is used. This command is actually a x specific version of the ``~>'' command. t Ic ~t Ar from Op Ar to Take a file from a remote x host. As in the put command the ``to'' file defaults to the ``from'' file name if it isn't specified. The remote host executes the command string ``cat 'from';echo ^A'' to send the file to .Nm . t Ic ~| Pipe the output from a remote command to a local x process. The command string sent to the local x system is processed by the shell. t Ic ~$ Pipe the output from a local x process to the remote host. The command string sent to the local x system is processed by the shell. t Ic ~C Fork a child process on the local system to perform special protocols such as .Tn XMODEM . The child program will be run with the following arrangement of file descriptors: l -column -offset indent 0 "<->" "remote tty in" t 0 Ta <-> Ta remote tty in t 1 Ta <-> Ta remote tty out t 2 Ta <-> Ta local tty out .El t Ic ~+ Synonym for ~C, provided for compatibility with other versions of .Nm cu . t Ic ~# Send a .Dv BREAK to the remote system. For systems which don't support the necessary .Ar ioctl call the break is simulated by a sequence of line speed changes and .Dv DEL characters. t Ic ~s Set a variable (see the discussion below). t Ic ~^Z Stop .Nm (only available with job control). t Ic ~^Y Stop only the ``local side'' of .Nm (only available with job control); the ``remote side'' of .Nm , the side that displays output from the remote host, is left running. t Ic ~? Get a summary of the tilde escapes .El
p .Nm uses the file
a /etc/remote to find how to reach a particular system and to find out how it should operate while talking to the system; refer to .Xr remote 5 for a full description. Each system has a default baud rate with which to establish a connection. If this value is not suitable, the baud rate to be used may be specified on the command line, e.g. .Ql "tip -300 mds" .
p When .Nm establishes a connection it sends out a connection message to the remote system; the default value, if any, is defined in
a /etc/remote (see .Xr remote 5 ) .
p When .Nm prompts for an argument (e.g. during setup of a file transfer) the line typed may be edited with the standard erase and kill characters. A null line in response to a prompt, or an interrupt, will abort the dialogue and return you to the remote machine.
p .Nm guards against multiple users connecting to a remote system by opening modems and terminal lines with exclusive access, and by honoring the locking protocol used by .Xr uucico 8 .
p During file transfers .Nm provides a running count of the number of lines transferred. When using the ~> and ~< commands, the ``eofread'' and ``eofwrite'' variables are used to recognize end-of-file when reading, and specify end-of-file when writing (see below). File transfers normally depend on tandem mode for flow control. If the remote system does not support tandem mode, ``echocheck'' may be set to indicate .Nm should synchronize with the remote system on the echo of each transmitted character.
p When .Nm must dial a phone number to connect to a system it will print various messages indicating its actions. .Nm supports the .Tn DEC DN Ns -11 and Racal-Vadic 831 auto-call-units; the .Tn DEC DF Ns 02 and .Tn DF Ns 03 , Ventel 212+, Racal-Vadic 3451, and Bizcomp 1031 and 1032 integral call unit/modems. .Ss VARIABLES .Nm maintains a set of .Ar variables which control its operation. Some of these variables are read-only to normal users (root is allowed to change anything of interest). Variables may be displayed and set through the ``s'' escape. The syntax for variables is patterned after .Xr vi 1 and .Xr mail 1 . Supplying ``all'' as an argument to the set command displays all variables readable by the user. Alternatively, the user may request display of a particular variable by attaching a `?' to the end. For example ``escape?'' displays the current escape character.
p Variables are numeric, string, character, or boolean values. Boolean variables are set merely by specifying their name; they may be reset by prepending a `!' to the name. Other variable types are set by concatenating an `=' and the value. The entire assignment must not have any blanks in it. A single set command may be used to interrogate as well as set a number of variables. Variables may be initialized at run time by placing set commands (without the ``~s'' prefix in a file
a .tiprc in one's home directory). The .Fl v option causes .Nm to display the sets as they are made. Certain common variables have abbreviations. The following is a list of common variables, their abbreviations, and their default values. l -tag -width Ar t Ar beautify (bool) Discard unprintable characters when a session is being scripted; abbreviated .Ar be . t Ar baudrate (num) The baud rate at which the connection was established; abbreviated .Ar ba . t Ar dialtimeout (num) When dialing a phone number, the time (in seconds) to wait for a connection to be established; abbreviated .Ar dial . t Ar echocheck (bool) Synchronize with the remote host during file transfer by waiting for the echo of the last character transmitted; default is .Ar off . t Ar eofread (str) The set of characters which signify an end-of-transmission during a ~< file transfer command; abbreviated .Ar eofr . t Ar eofwrite (str) The string sent to indicate end-of-transmission during a ~> file transfer command; abbreviated .Ar eofw . t Ar eol (str) The set of characters which indicate an end-of-line. .Nm will recognize escape characters only after an end-of-line. t Ar escape (char) The command prefix (escape) character; abbreviated .Ar es ; default value is `~'. t Ar exceptions (str) The set of characters which should not be discarded due to the beautification switch; abbreviated .Ar ex ; default value is ``\et\en\ef\eb''. t Ar force (char) The character used to force literal data transmission; abbreviated .Ar fo ; default value is `^P'. t Ar framesize (num) The amount of data (in bytes) to buffer between file system writes when receiving files; abbreviated .Ar fr . t Ar host (str) The name of the host to which you are connected; abbreviated .Ar ho . t Ar prompt (char) The character which indicates an end-of-line on the remote host; abbreviated .Ar pr ; default value is `\en'. This value is used to synchronize during data transfers. The count of lines transferred during a file transfer command is based on receipt of this character. t Ar raise (bool) Upper case mapping mode; abbreviated .Ar ra ; default value is .Ar off . When this mode is enabled, all lower case letters will be mapped to upper case by .Nm for transmission to the remote machine. t Ar raisechar (char) The input character used to toggle upper case mapping mode; abbreviated .Ar rc ; default value is `^A'. t Ar record (str) The name of the file in which a session script is recorded; abbreviated .Ar rec ; default value is ``tip.record''. t Ar script (bool) Session scripting mode; abbreviated .Ar sc ; default is .Ar off . When .Ar script is .Li true , .Nm will record everything transmitted by the remote machine in the script record file specified in .Ar record . If the .Ar beautify switch is on, only printable .Tn ASCII characters will be inclu
Indexes created Sat Sep 20 22:09:52 GMT 2025