NAME

       splitvt - run two shells in a split window

SYNOPSIS

       splitvt [options] [shell]

OPTIONS

       -upper command
              Runs 'command' in the upper window

       -lower command
              Runs 'command' in the lower window

       -bottom
              Stats with the focus in the bottom window

       -s numlines
              Sets  'numlines'  to  the  number  of lines in the top window.  This number will be
              modified if the screen isn't big enough to handle the full size.

       -t title
              Sets an xterm title bar to 'title'

       -login Runs the programs under each window as though they  were  login  shells.   This  is
              useful to have csh source it's .login file, bash source .profile, etc.

       -nologin
              Overrides any "set login on" statement in the startup file.

       -rcfile file
              Loads 'file' as the startup file instead of ~/.splitvtrc.

       -norc  Suppresses loading your ~/.splitvtrc

       -f     Allow  setting  the  height  of  either the top or the bottom window to less than 3
              lines.

       -v     Print out the version number of splitvt

DESCRIPTION

       This program splits the screen into two windows, one above the other, and runs a shell  in
       each  one.  The default shell is taken from the SHELL environment variable, or /bin/csh if
       SHELL isn't in the environment, but another shell can be specified on the command line.

       The top window is the default current window, but you can change to the other by  pressing
       ^W.  Pressing ^V will quote the next character to the current shell.  Pressing ^O will put
       splitvt into command mode.

       These special characters (command mode, switch window, and quote next  character)  can  be
       modified from within the .splitvtrc file.

       When  in  command mode, splitvt will read one non-numeric character, perform the requested
       command, and then revert to normal operations.  Numeric characters are  interpreted  as  a
       parameter for the specified command.  The currently supported commands are:

       'h'    Print a help window for the escape commands

       '-'    Shrink the current window

       '+'    Expand the current window

       'c'    Select a block of text in the current window

       'p'    Paste the selected text to the current window

       'k'    Kill the current window (hangup signal)

       'x'    Lock the screen, after prompting for password

       'r'    Repaint the screen (clearing screen garbage)

       'q'    Quickly quit splitvt, killing the running shells

       More functions may be added in the future.

       If  the -s command line option is used, the upper window will be bound to the user defined
       number of lines even if the screen is resized.  Otherwise, the screen will be  split  into
       two equal parts based on the new size of the screen.

       The  environment  variable  SPLITVT  is set in the shells forked by splitvt.  In the shell
       running in the upper window, this variable is set to the value "upper",  while  the  shell
       running in the lower window has this variable set to the value "lower".  This is useful in
       shell scripts to provide different behavior  depending  on  which  window  the  script  is
       running  in.   An example of this is shown in the file "menu" in the examples directory in
       the splitvt distribution.

       When splitvt starts up, it looks in your home directory for a file named

       .splitvtrc You can set a number of parameters from within this file, including all of  the
       special characters, the default number of lines in the upper window, whether or not to run
       the commands as login shells, and even default commands to run in each window.

       Here is an example of a .splitvtrc file:

            # This is an example .splitvtrc file.
            set command_char        ^O
            set quote_char          ^V
            set switch_char         ^W
            set upper_lines         12
            run -upper              /bin/sh
            run -lower              top
            set login               on
            # This next line would override the above run statements
            #run /bin/tcsh

       If programs like vi are doing strange things to the window while in splitvt, you  probably
       need  to  set  the  LINES  environment  variable to a correct value, or set the terminal's
       window sizing correctly.  This should be done automatically, but may need to be corrected.

       If you are running under an xterm window, the title bar will probably be updated  to  show
       the  version  of  splitvt  that  you are running.  Under a true xterm window, you can also
       switch which half of the window you are typing into by clicking the mouse in the  half  of
       the  window  in  which  you want to type.  You can also drag and drop the separator bar by
       pressing down on the mouse button over the separator bar,  holding  it  down,  moving  the
       mouse to where you want the bar to end up, and then releasing the button.

       splitvt  will attempt to erase the current utmp entry, and replace it with entries for the
       two windows.  This allows you to use programs such as 'talk' within the  splitvt  windows.
       If  you  do  not  have write permission to the /var/run/utmp file, you will not be able to
       modify the utmp entries.

       splitvt can be made set-uid root.  splitvt will reset its user id to that  of  the  person
       running  it,  just  before  it  exec()'s  the shell under the window.  The splitvt process
       remains with root permissions, and will change ownership of the pseudo terminals  to  that
       of the person running splitvt, and then reset it to root when the window is closed.

       SPLITVT IS NOT GUARANTEED TO BE A SAFE SET-UID PROGRAM!

       I  have done all I know to keep splitvt a safely usable set-uid program, but I do not know
       everything, and am not responsible for any security weaknesses splitvt might posess.

BUGS

       When used with a certain public domain version of ksh, you have to manually kill -9 on the
       shell  processes after you quit splitvt.  This has to do with a bug in that version of ksh
       (Version 06/03/86a and possibly others).

       If splitvt is compiled with xterm support, when run under an  xterm,  the  cut  and  paste
       feature  is  semi-disabled.   The  title bar may also be reset to the string "xterm" after
       splitvt quits.  See the comments at the top of splitvt.c for how to disable xterm support.

       Ansi colors are not repainted on screen refresh.

CAVEATS

       There may be conflicts between splitvt's characters and other programs.   You  can  either
       change splitvt's default characters with command line options, or you can type Ctrl-V (the
       quote character) within splitvt, and the next character typed will be sent to the  current
       window, no matter what it is.

       splitvt  can  only  be used by terminals using vt100 emulation, due to the use of specific
       vt100 escape codes.  (vt300, xterm, Linux console, etc, emulation also works)

       When running in an xterm, if you press the escape key,  you  will  have  to  type  another
       character in order for the escape to be seen by the running program.

AUTHOR

       Sam Lantinga   slouken@cs.ucdavis.edu