Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!shadooby!samsung!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!ucsd!ucbvax!hplabs!hplabsz!mayer
From: mayer@hplabsz.HPL.HP.COM (Niels Mayer)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: redirecting stderr; passing arg lists
Message-ID: <4338@hplabsz.HPL.HP.COM>
Date: 10 Nov 89 01:22:06 GMT
References: <8911081827.AA12003@turnpike.sun.com>
Reply-To: mayer@hplabs.hp.com (Niels Mayer)
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Labs, Software Technology Lab, Palo Alto, CA.
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In article <8911081827.AA12003@turnpike.sun.com> argv@SUN.COM (Dan Heller) writes:
>If you've been reading comp.windows.x, you'll see a very short-lived
>discussion about how XtAddInput is broken --I recommend *strongly*
>that you avoid using it till it's fixed.  This includes R4; I checked
>the source.  The problem is that your routine gets called continuously
>rather than, as the spec says, "when there is data to be read."
>(details below.)

Thanks for the info, Dan. However, I need some clarification:

I've been using XtAddInput() with no problems in programs like xwebster
(ftp from expo.lcs.mit.edu:contib/xwebster.tar.Z) and winterp (hopefully on
x11r4 contrib tape). I have not noticed the problems you describe in either
program.

Does the problem arise only when trying to use XtAddInput() with a
FILE*/Pipe? I think I might have seen such problems in an early version of
xwebster in which I communicated to the webster dictionary server via a
telnet process that had been popen'd. I then decided to make things more
efficient by mucking with sockets directly. Winterp also uses sockets
selected via XtAddInput() in order to allow other programs to send lisp
forms to the "widget interpreter" (a lisp server). Both of these use
XtAddInput() with no problems that I can tell.

I seem to have missed the "short lived iscussion about how XtAddInput is
broken". Would anyone happen to have it archived anywhere? Can you
mail it to me, or repost it?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
	    Niels Mayer -- hplabs!mayer -- mayer@hplabs.hp.com
		  Human-Computer Interaction Department
		       Hewlett-Packard Laboratories
			      Palo Alto, CA.
				   *