Egad! Back in the day all of the /dev/tty entries were world writable. I used to troll CMU CS Rogue players (when I wasn't playing) from time to time by sending a string to their tty that grabbed the cursor, moved it to where the messages appeared (upper left corner?) and typing "The dangling modifier struck!" That's all it did. I got a lot of pleasure when I overheard two faculty members comparing notes on their experiences with the dangling modifier. Best, Marc ===== nygeek.net mindthegapdialogs.com/home On Fri, Dec 13, 2024 at 10:53 AM Larry McVoy wrote: > I loved talk when CS was running BSD on a VAX. You could see who was on > and talk them. Very handy and it was sort of social. > > It's crazy how things were back then, open ports listening for all sorts > of things. I think we were pretty unaware of how nasty the internet would > get. > > On Fri, Dec 13, 2024 at 10:22:22AM -0500, Clem Cole wrote: > > As for the motivation -- it was simple. UCB is on a hill. I lived at > the > > base of hill and I only wanted to walk up it once a day. Our office > was a > > big pool of about 20 of us next to the CAD machine room on the second > floor > > of Cory Hall. Somebody was usually in the office most nights, but not > > everyone. We all had modems and terminals at home, but only one phone > > line. We had 3 Vaxes in the CAD group, plus my Array Processor. So I > > wanted to be able to ask someone like Peter or TQ to reset the AP for me > if > > I hosed it when I was working from home when I was debugging it. Plus > > the obvious social aspects -- "hey you want go get a Pizza/Beer etc..." > > But since we might be working on a different system, Kipps' hack was > > useless. > > ??? > > ??? > > ??? > > ??? > > > > On Fri, Dec 13, 2024 at 10:14???AM Clem Cole wrote: > > > > > Yes -- I can give this history. > > > Kipp wrote an early version for 4.1BSD - but it is not the version in > the > > > releases. It ran on Ernie and did not do as much. > > > I had used a different program on the PDP-10's and the ARPANET and I > > > started over when Joy added sockets for 4.1A. I also made the infamous > use > > > of vax integers instead of network integers (and I knew better - but > really > > > did not think about until a few years later when I was at Masscomp and > > > compiled it for the 68000 -- ugh). That version still had a couple of > bugs > > > in it (i.e. hung in the 4.1A networking code occasionally), but worked > well > > > enough on the CAD systems. I went away to a USENIX conference and > while I > > > was gone, my officemate Peter (Moore) took my code and fixed the > problem, > > > plus he put it into RCS. I gave that to Sam and that's the version > that > > > went out in 4.1C and beyond. > > > > > > Clem > > > > > > > > > ??? > > > ??? > > > > > > On Fri, Dec 13, 2024 at 9:29???AM Dan Cross wrote: > > > > > >> I'm curious if anyone has any history they can share about the BSD > > >> "talk" program. > > >> > > >> I was fond of this back when it was still (relatively) common, but > > >> given the way it's architected I definitely see why it fell out of use > > >> as the Internet grew. Still, does anybody know what the history behind > > >> it is? Initially, I thought it was written by Mike Karels, but that > > >> was just my speculation from SCCS spelunking, and looking at the > > >> sources from 4.2, I see RCS header strings that indicate it was > > >> written by "moore" (Peter Moore?). talk.c says, "Written by Kipp > > >> Hickman". > > >> > > >> It seems to have arrived pretty early on with respect to the > > >> introduction of TCP/IP in BSD: the README alludes to some things > > >> coming up in 4.1c. Clem, you seem to have had a hand in it, and are > > >> credited (along with Peter Moore) for making it work on 4.1a. > > >> > > >> So I guess the question is, what was the motivation? Was it just to > > >> have a more pleasing user-to-user communications experience, or was > > >> discussion across the network an explicit goal? There's a note in > > >> talk.c ("Modified to run between hosts by Peter Moore, 8/19/82") that > > >> suggests this wasn't the original intent. Who thought up the > > >> character-at-a-time display mode? > > >> > > >> Thanks for any insights. > > >> > > >> - Dan C. > > >> > > > > > -- > --- > Larry McVoy Retired to fishing > http://www.mcvoy.com/lm/boat >