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Date: Tue, 25 Apr 95 19:08 PDT
From: steve@work.bellingham.wa.us
To: terry@cs.weber.edu
CC: gert@greenie.muc.de, timb@thud.cdrom.com, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org,
        neko@greenie.muc.de, knarf@nasim.cube.net, mgetty@muc.de
In-reply-to: <9504260048.AA03107@cs.weber.edu> (terry@cs.weber.edu)
Subject: Re: Discussion about mgetty...
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>>>>> "Terry" == Terry Lambert <terry@cs.weber.edu> writes:

    Terry>           [...]          thereby
    Terry> precluding use of the port for bidirectional (both incoming
    Terry> and outbound) use.

What exactly aren't you listening to?  I am only one of hundreds of
mgetty users who use their modems "for bidirectional (both incoming
and outbound) use" daily.  If a voice call comes in and I'm not in the
office, vgetty takes a message like an answering machine -- then hangs
up and dials my pager.  If a data or fax call rings, the fax is
received, or a login prompt is presented.  When my UUCP system decides
to poll, it just polls -- blocking on a locked port (UUCP lock) if
something or somebody else is using the modem.  When I run Netscape
from a Windows computer elsewhere in my office, diald 0.7 connects to
my ISP to bring me on line.  This doesn't seem like much of a kludge
to me.  It seems like an extremely flexible system, and one that to my
knowledge could only have been implemented using mgetty.

Steven Work
Renaissance Labs
+1 360 647-1833, fax too
steve@work.bellingham.wa.us