picoterm

Pi Pico VGA Terminal Emulator For RC2014

Added the german layout but still unable to run the resulting picoterm.uf2 on the pioc.

PicoTerm is a terminal emulator written specifically for this module. Currently it runs 80 columns by 30 lines in black and white mode. Switching to 40 column colour version will be available shortly. It can use VT100 style escape codes, with support for the following

• \ESC[?25l | Cursor invisible
• \ESC[?25h | Cursor visible
• \ESC[H | Move to 0-0
• \ESC[s | Save the cursor position
• \ESC[u | Move cursor to previously saved position
• \ESC[-Row-;-Col-H | Move to -Row-,-Col-
• \ESC[0K | Clear from cursor to the end of the line
• \ESC[1K | Clear from the beginning of the current line to the cursor
• \ESC[2K | Clear the whole line
• \ESC[2J | Clear the screen and move the cursor to 0-0
• \ESC[-n-A | Move the cursor up -n- lines
• \ESC[-n-B | Move the cursor down -n- lines
• \ESC[-n-C | Move the cursor forward -n- characters
• \ESC[-n-D | Move the cursor backward -n- characters
• \ESC[0m | normal text (should also set foreground & background colours to normal)
• \ESC[7m | reverse text
• \ESC[0J | clear screen from cursor
• \ESC[1J | clear screen to cursor
• \ESC[3J | same as \ESC[2J
• \ESC[nS | scroll whole page up by n rows (default 1 if n missing)

40 col colour only: (sequence is ignored, no effect in 80 col b/w)

• \ESC[38;5;-n-m | Set foreground colour to -n- (0-255)
• \ESC[48;5;-n-m | Set background colour to -n- (0-255)

USB keyboards are supported via a USB OTG adapter – however, not all keyboards currently work. Most cheap generic keyboards seem to work fine, however, the testing sample is still fairly small. Hopefully with more data it will be easier to identify exactly which keyboards are likely to work and which aren’t, or, better still, a simple software fix will get more working.

Uploading firmware

The Pi Pico uses a UF2 bootloader to appear as a mass storage device so that new firmware can be uploaded to it. To do this, connect a Micro USB lead between the Pico and your PC/Mac/Laptop/Raspberry Pi/Android Phone. Then push the BOOTSEL button on the Pico. Whilst holding this down, push and release the RUN button on the VGA board. (Trust me. This is easier to to than to put in to words!). The Pico will then show up as a drive on your computer. Simply drag and drop the UF2 firmware on to this drive. The Pico will automatically reboot and disconnect once this is complete.