Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!think!harvard!cmcl2!phri!roy From: roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith) Newsgroups: net.unix-wizards Subject: Re: Window Systems and Job Control Message-ID: <2306@phri.UUCP> Date: Sat, 5-Apr-86 22:39:56 EST Article-I.D.: phri.2306 Posted: Sat Apr 5 22:39:56 1986 Date-Received: Wed, 9-Apr-86 21:25:46 EST References: <2369@brl-smoke.ARPA> Reply-To: roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith) Organization: Public Health Research Inst. (NY, NY) Lines: 32 Summary: windows for the common man In article <2369@brl-smoke.ARPA> swa@mit-borax.arpa (Steven Augart) writes: > [...] for those of us who do NOT have a window system [...] job control > offers a lot of functionality that systems without it don't provide. We > will need job control until the last hardcopy terminal dies, until the > last 24 X 80 screen is is a museum. There is no reason why you need a bit-map display to have windows. We run the Lennon/Truscott WM window manager which provides a sort of poor man's window system on ASCII terminals (even on our old ADM-5's). It's not as fancy as windows on a Sun, but it works. There really isn't much excuse for not having windows, and WM puts to bed the old wives' tale that you need a $5k piece of hardware on your desk to get them (you do however need 4.2bsd, at least for the version of WM we have). Come to think of it, emacs gives you ASCII windows too (with Apollo-style transcript pads). Of course, having 4.2, we also have job control. Guess what? They complement each other very nicely. Right now, I've got an "su" running in the background with wm underneath it. In one window I'm running a big job and in another window I'm monitoring the progress it's making. In reality however, I've got the whole schmear hidden in the background while I read news for a while. I suppose I could have just opened up another full-screen window and su'ed back to myself to run news, but I didn't feel like doing it that way. I wouldn't have the same history list I left behind with my original login shell (not to mention eating up another pty). The capability exists to have both job control and windows on an ASCII terminal, so why not have them both? Each solves a different problem. -- Roy Smith, {allegra,philabs}!phri!roy System Administrator, Public Health Research Institute 455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016