The terminal output functions send output to a text terminal, or keep
track of output sent to the terminal. The variable baud-rate
tells you what Emacs thinks is the output speed of the terminal.
This variable’s value is the output speed of the terminal, as far as Emacs knows. Setting this variable does not change the speed of actual data transmission, but the value is used for calculations such as padding.
It also affects decisions about whether to scroll part of the screen or repaint on text terminals. See Forcing Redisplay, for the corresponding functionality on graphical terminals.
The value is measured in baud.
If you are running across a network, and different parts of the
network work at different baud rates, the value returned by Emacs may be
different from the value used by your local terminal. Some network
protocols communicate the local terminal speed to the remote machine, so
that Emacs and other programs can get the proper value, but others do
not. If Emacs has the wrong value, it makes decisions that are less
than optimal. To fix the problem, set baud-rate.
This function sends string to terminal without alteration.
Control characters in string have terminal-dependent effects.
(If you need to display non-ASCII text on the terminal, encode it
using one of the functions described in Explicit Encoding and Decoding.)
This function operates only on text terminals. terminal may be
a terminal object, a frame, or nil for the selected frame’s
terminal. In batch mode, string is sent to stdout when
terminal is nil.
One use of this function is to define function keys on terminals that have downloadable function key definitions. For example, this is how (on certain terminals) to define function key 4 to move forward four characters (by transmitting the characters C-u C-f to the computer):
(send-string-to-terminal "\eF4\^U\^F")
⇒ nil
This function is used to open a termscript file that will record
all the characters sent by Emacs to the terminal. It returns
nil. Termscript files are useful for investigating problems
where Emacs garbles the screen, problems that are due to incorrect
Termcap entries or to undesirable settings of terminal options more
often than to actual Emacs bugs. Once you are certain which characters
were actually output, you can determine reliably whether they correspond
to the Termcap specifications in use.
(open-termscript "../junk/termscript")
⇒ nil
You close the termscript file by calling this function with an
argument of nil.
See also open-dribble-file in Recording Input.