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From: irick@ecn.purdue.edu (GarBear Irick)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: write/talk detection
Message-ID: <1990Oct29.195519.24411@ecn.purdue.edu>
Date: 29 Oct 90 19:55:19 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Purdue Society for Better Computing
Lines: 20

OK, I have an easy one for you wizards out there (Dan???  Dave???:)...

Is there any way, using sh, C, black magic, etc. to detect when another user
has done a write or a talk-request to yor terminal?  I would like to write a 
small program to check for them when I am away from my machine and have the
program send back a small reply, something like "irick is not here, leave mail."
My terminal is usually idle in my dorm room (thank GOD for Data-Over-Voice!!),
so I end up with people paging me and thinking I am ignoring them.  (People
too stupid to check idle time... :-)

I've considered somthing like "csh | filter_to_grep_for_writes | tee /dev/tty",
but that seems messy.  I am sure pty will do it (right Dan?), but alas we don't
have pty installed at our site.  Any ideas are welcome, preferably e-mail.
Thanks in advance to all you UNIX-ninjas out there with solutions!


-- 
Gary A. Irick,  Purdue University | "You can log out any time you like,
INTERNET: irick@en.ecn.purdue.edu |  But you can never leave!"
UUCP:     ...!pur-ee!irick        |       (apologies to The Eagles)