Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ncar!noao!arizona!gmt
From: gmt@cs.arizona.edu (Gregg Townsend)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.programmer
Subject: Re: how to put a program into .plan file
Message-ID: <103@owl.cs.arizona.edu>
Date: 25 Sep 90 00:47:25 GMT
References: <12175@chaph.usc.edu>
Distribution: usa
Organization: U of Arizona CS Dept, Tucson
Lines: 13

In article <12175@chaph.usc.edu> szeto@aludra.usc.edu (Johnny Szeto) writes:

>  Is there any way to put a shell script or a c-prog. into .plan
>  so that when someone fingers me it will be activated?

I did this by making my .plan file a named pipe and driving it from a shell
script.  The script repeatedly executed a simple program and directed its
output to the .plan file.  Whenever finger (or cat or anything else) opened
the file, the program would execute once and print the time and temperature.
(The temperature was just an educated guess, but it fooled several people!)

    Gregg Townsend / Computer Science Dept / Univ of Arizona / Tucson, AZ 85721
    +1 602 621 4325     gmt@cs.arizona.edu     110 57 16 W / 32 13 45 N / +758m