PuTTY, I'm leaving you.

My PATH is longer than 1024 characters which prevents Poderosa from opening a cygwin session. I get this exception:

Index was out of range. Must be non-negative and less than the size of the collection.
Parameter name: startIndex
at System.String.CtorCharArrayStartLength(Char[] value, Int32 startIndex, Int32 length)
at Poderosa.Protocols.LocalShellUtil.PrepareEnv(ICygwinParameter p) in C:\P4\src\Protocols\LocalShell.cs:line 155
at Poderosa.Protocols.LocalShellUtil.Connector.Connect() in C:\P4\src\Protocols\LocalShell.cs:line 99
at Poderosa.Protocols.LocalShellUtil.Connector.AsyncConnect() in C:\P4\src\Protocols\LocalShell.cs:line 70

PrepareEnv looks like this in reflector:

protected static void PrepareEnv(ICygwinParameter p)
{
if (!_cygwinDLL_loaded)
{
char[] buf = new char[0x400];
int n = Win32.GetEnvironmentVariable("PATH", buf, buf.Length);
string newval = new string(buf, 0, n) + ";" + CygwinUtil.GuessRootDirectory() + @"\bin";
Win32.SetEnvironmentVariable("PATH", newval);
_cygwinDLL_loaded = true;
}
}

That call to Win32.GetEnvironmentVariable() is a PInvoke to kernel32.dll:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms683188%28VS.85%29.aspx

The return value from GetEnvironmentVariable() will be greater than 1024 in my case, causing the exception to be thrown in the string constructor on the next line.

To work around it, use NetDasm to modify the IL so it creates a 4096-byte buffer instead of 1024 bytes. Make sure when you backup Poderosa.Protocols.dll that your backup doesn't have a .dll extension, otherwise it'll try to load both DLLS and raise an exception about duplicate extension points.

From snooping around the GuessRootDirectory() function, I found another quirk. If your cygwin bin directory isn't in your PATH then you may need to create a registry key called "/" under "HKCU\Cygnus Solutions\Cygwin\mounts v2" and inside it a REG_SZ called "native" with a value pointing to your cygwin installation.

I'm wedded to the rxvt that comes with Cygwin (contra infestation, Windows without Cygwin is unusable IMHO) - it's compiled not as an X application, but with a minimal wrapper DLL that emulates just enough of X to let rxvt work without an X server.

For copy, just select text. Works like a charm.

Right-click terminates a selection range started with left-click; I don't see why I'd want a context menu, though. Rxvt doesn't have any menus. Middle-click pastes, but is infrequently used.

It does need some tweaks in your ~/.Xdefaults to look nice, though.

I also use rxvt on Unixes, seems to run faster and suck up less (a *lot* less) memory than Gnome/KDE alternatives, even with 10K line buffer.

No tabs though.

I've already try poderosa but some matters 'as not auto loading of config) came.

I like this putty port...
http://kitty.9bis.com/

Before you berate PuTTY and other terminal emulators for not
using Ctrl-C / Ctrl-V for copy and paste, fire up Windows's
own cmd.exe and see how selection works there. You will need
to turn on 'QuickEdit mode' in the preferences to select
text directly with the mouse. But whether or not that option
is turned on, the selection and copy/paste behaviour is quite
different to other Windows programs, and fairly similar to
PuTTY's.

I'm all for consistent user interfaces, but when even Windows
itself uses different conventions for command windows and GUI
applications, it's reasonable (consistent, even) for third-
party command windows to do the same.

As for bringing up a context menu on right-click, see
Window -> Selection in PuTTY's configuration dialogue box.

(BTW, this captcha is almost impossible - it took me more
than ten attempts.)

> Saved authentication data!

It seems to me the problem is using passwords then. Use Putty agent. Plink and Pagent have been happily wed for years (at least a century, in your timezone) and there should be no need for _any_ authentication past the initial passphrase for Pageant once you start it.

RSA auth is the way to go. Remembering passwords is always a low stoop.

... IMHO :)

Seth

I use Putty with Putty Connection Manager (http://puttycm.free.fr), that way all my Putty windows are in one interface and in tabs and not spread around my taskbar.

Why do you even need to hit Ctrl-C? The second you highlight something in Putty it is AUTOMATICALLY copied to the clipboard. All you have to do is Ctrl-V in what ever application you are pasting it in...or if back into Putty just Right-Click. There is no issue here.

There is no need to emulate the old-style UNIX 3-button mouse, it's not needed. Not even when using Linux/UNIX on the desktop.

> Yes, I know I could use screen. I don't want to; not all of
> them are on the same server, and even if they were I still
> want tabs. No, I do not care that it is not the UNIX way.
> The UNIX way is programmer-oriented process wank rather than user-oriented software.

I think your perception of the UNIX way is flawed in some way. You realize that essentially all terminal apps on Linux have been tabbed for approx. the last 10 years, right?

Stepping into windows feels ultra-awkward b/c of the lack of basic tabbed terminal access in the base os, imo (though console2 is pretty good when it works).

OK, so while I love Linux as a server environment, it gives me the creeping horrors on the desktop and I stick to Windows there.

Oh man. I'm just the opposite. I've slowly become more frustrated with Windows over the past year; the awful security settings on my Windows XP netbook finally prompted me to install Ubuntu on it... so now the Linux-based computers in this house outnumber the lonely Windows-based laptop by 3 to 1 now.

Poderosa: looks hot. Wish I could get Tunnelier to use it, though.

I'm not going to argue that you should not hold your opinion, but I would like to present mine.

Having ^C be mapped to a copy operation would, IMO, be an incredibly dense choice. I need to send SIGINT to the running process on the other end of the session far more often than I need to copy text. Now, I will say that the copy/paste behavior should be more obvious, but I honestly prefer it to the Windows way.

One option, as you suggest, would be to have ^C copy when text is selected and send a literal ^C to the other end when text is not selected. I think this would be far worse than any other option. It would be horribly confusing -- ^C now has two behaviors, and unless you have actually read the documentation on copy/paste (which, let's face it, nobody who uses PuTTY ever does) it is going to take you far longer to understand what is going on than even the current default behavior.

To boil it down to a simple statement: when I am using *any* terminal to a UNIX box, regardless of the platform the terminal is running on, I expect ^C to kill the thing on the other end. Period. Substituting in Windows behaviors for *expected* UNIX behaviors in a *UNIX shell* would be a stupid choice.

Again, IMO.

(As a footnote... If it doesn't just work, it doesn't work well enough. This is the primary reason I do not use Windows. :) )

If you're coming from a Windows background, then you might want to try out Linux Mint. I switched over to Linux desktops about four years ago from a life in Windows and have personally found that Linux Mint is the most user-friendly distro I've used.

Seriously, give Linux desktops a chance. It seems like a huge hurtle at first, but it most definitely is worth it.