Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!lloyd!kent
From: kent@lloyd.camex.uucp (Kent Borg)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: uw
Message-ID: <122@lloyd.camex.uucp>
Date: 6 Aug 88 01:52:38 GMT
Lines: 53

The following is a true story in praise of uw.

A few minutes ago while logged in from home to a Sun at work (using 
uw, a multiwindow terminal program that was posted to 
comp.sys.mac.binaries a few months ago) I got mail from a coworker 
saying goodbye, he would be back from vacation in two weeks.

No!  I needed to talk to him before he left!  I quickly started 
"rlogin"-g into the main Suns at work to find the one he was logged 
into (I hoped still) so I could "talk" to him through Unix.  I 
found him.  His login had been idle for a few minutes, but he is not 
one to leave for two weeks without logging off first (not that our 
machines can stay up for two weeks, but still...).  I typed talk and 
waited.  It rang him, and again.  He wasn't at his desk.  Shit!

OK.  Look to see who else is logged in and not idle for too long (in 
other words, still there Friday evening), maybe they could grab him 
before he left--I couldn't phone by voice because I couldn't be sure 
someone would answer after hours (especially on a Friday night).  I 
grabbed another window into the Sun and typed "w" to see who was 
logged in (I left the talk window ringing on the left side of the 
screen and didn't cover it.  Uw keeps updating its windows--even as a 
background task under MultiFinder).  No one was logged in with a small 
idle time.  I "rlogin"-ed to the major machines we have, looking for 
somebody.  No one.  I ran "rup" to remember what the other etherneted 
Suns are called (we have a bunch).  I left that in its window and 
opened yet another to start "rlogin"-g in to them to see whether I 
could find anybody still there.

Well, I didn't find anyone home.  So I went back to what I was 
doing--but kept the one window on the left ringing and visible.  
Finally he answered.  (whew!)  I got matters sorted out and said 
goodbye for two weeks.

At this point I am thrilled with uw and have to tell someone.  I sent 
a hunk of mail to a coworker and then started to type this.  The final 
beauty of uw is it runs on a Macintosh.  I have only 1 meg and so 
can't run MindWrite, my normal word processor, with much else, but I 
CAN run MockWrite with no problem.  As you can guess I prefer 
MockWrite (at 54K for the entire MockPackage running on an inexpensive 
machine) to Gnu Emacs (bunches and bunches of memory on a Sun).  

I want a big screen.  I have about a half dozen windows open at the 
moment, windows I need to have be big enough for me to use, windows I 
need to move among.  I want a big screen.

Thank you John D. Bruner!  Uw is the most civilized way I know for 
dealing with a Unix machine.

Kent Borg
kent@lloyd.uucp
or
hscfvax!lloyd!kent