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From: nather@ut-sally.UUCP (Ed Nather)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: paging in the terminal driver
Message-ID: <9303@ut-sally.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 17-Oct-87 11:36:29 EDT
Article-I.D.: ut-sally.9303
Posted: Sat Oct 17 11:36:29 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 18-Oct-87 11:03:08 EDT
References: <573@elxsi.UUCP> <682@its63b.ed.ac.uk> <796@quacky.UUCP>
Organization: U. Texas CS Dept., Austin, Texas
Lines: 27
Keywords: output pagination
Summary: Doesn't *have* to be there ...

In article <796@quacky.UUCP>, sjc@mips.UUCP (Steve "The" Correll) writes:
> In article <682@its63b.ed.ac.uk>, adam@its63b.ed.ac.uk (ERCF02 Adam Hamilton) writes:
> > Several years ago when I first met UNIX, the UKUUG distribution had a terminal
> > driver which did the paging function. (I.e. no more than a screenful of output
> > without some terminal input, like a space).
> 
> I too had the privilege once of working on a system (thanks to jdb at
> s1.mordor.gov) which provided an ioctl call to enable paging and specify the
> screen size. Despite  all of the aesthetic arguments against putting this into
> the kernel, in practice it was just plain pleasant to use.
> 

Paging is such a simple chore it really doesn't take up much code space.  In
the design of PCnix, a Unix-like collection of software tools for IBM PCs,
I wrote a short pager in C and included it in any program that sends output
to the screen.  MS-DOS has an IOCTL call that allows you to find out if the
output has been redirected into a file or device -- in that case the screen
pause is bypassed.

It's so convenient and intuitive I regularly make mistakes on "real" Unix,
and have to go back and pipe things through "more."

-- 
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
{allegra,ihnp4}!{noao,ut-sally}!utastro!nather
nather@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU