Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site brl-tgr.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!gatech!seismo!brl-tgr!gwyn From: gwyn@brl-tgr.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) Newsgroups: net.unix-wizards Subject: Re: am I in background? Message-ID: <187@brl-tgr.ARPA> Date: Fri, 29-Nov-85 22:59:46 EST Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.187 Posted: Fri Nov 29 22:59:46 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 1-Dec-85 03:12:09 EST References: <129@wgivax.UUCP> <13400017@mirror.UUCP> <3046@sun.uucp> Organization: Ballistic Research Lab Lines: 18 > There's no way to tell if you were run in the background that works with all > shells on all systems. Besides, if you have job control you may have been > in the background 10 minutes ago but may be in the foreground now. If you > need to know this, think harder about *why* you need to know this; you may > find that you don't really need to know it, or that it isn't really want you > need to know. Yes, yes! A plea to UNIX software developers: Please remember what UNIX is all about, and make your tools as generally useful as possible. For example: create a separate computation program that is unaware of the details of its environment, and create a separate driver program if you must for interactive use on brain- damaged video terminals. (No, ordinary video terminals are NOT the nicest interactive interface.) Indeed, it is easy enough to provide an interactive shell script that prompts the user through parameter specification and then invokes the real, general-purpose program with the right arguments and plumbing; often that is quite user-friendly enough.