Unix Type-ahead problem

[Juergen Wagner]

In article <810053 at hpsemc.HP.COM> gph at hpsemc.HP.COM (Paul Houtz) writes:
>...
>   Do all unix systems echo the characters to the screen no matter what
>is going on as you type them?  I have only worked on one type.
>...

It depends on whether the driver which accepts character by character from
a terminal echoes input (because it is in some `echo' mode), or whether your
application has to decide the question of echoing.

By default, UNIX shells put the terminal driver into a mode in which it
echoes all its input. That's reasonable for most applications. However, under
Emacs and other programs which perform special interpretation of characters,
and/or wish to maintain a particular screen layout, it is necessary to echo
characters from the respective application program.

If UNIX could echo characters as they are *consumed* by the program which reads
from a terminal, as opposed to when they are *typed*, you would get the desired
behavior.

-- 
Juergen Wagner		   			gandalf at csli.stanford.edu
						 wagner at arisia.xerox.com