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dos 437 fonts and configs for viewing ANSI art in xterm

ansiterm

Proper configurations for viewing ANSI art or telnetting/SSHing to BBSes in xterm and macOS Terminal.app.

Includes dos437, a BDF pixel-for-pixel translation of the DOS 437 codepage font, with a converted TrueType version.

https://i.imgur.com/eUMMpQW.png

xterm

Convert the BDF font to a PCF font (if necessary) and then install it:

  • bdftopcf dos437.bdf > font/dos437.pcf
  • sudo cp font/dos437.pcf /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/
  • cd /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/; sudo mkfontdir

Then run ansiterm.sh to launch xterm with proper colors and the dos437 font. For tiling window managers, make sure the resulting xterm window is exactly 80 characters wide.

Terminal.app

Install the TTF font (double-click it to open it in font book, and then click install) and then install the terminal settings profile by double clicking it.

Verify that the font used is dos437 in 8pt, antialias is off, the character encoding is "western (ascii)", and the terminal is 80x24.

In either xterm or Terminal.app, ANSI art files should display properly with cat. BBSes should display fine through the standard telnet or SSH programs.