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To: "Garrett A. Wollman" <wollman@lcs.mit.edu>
cc: Charles Owens <owensc@enc.edu>,
        questions list FreeBSD <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org>
Subject: Re: CPU usage of "talk" 
In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 08 Nov 1995 15:16:31 EST."
             <9511082016.AA25466@halloran-eldar.lcs.mit.edu> 
Reply-To: jdl@chromatic.com
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Date: Wed, 08 Nov 1995 22:57:35 -0600
From: Jon Loeliger <jdl@chrome.onramp.net>
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Apparently, "Garrett A. Wollman" scribbled:
> That `-' [in ps output] is the big hint.  `talk' is another one of those
> broken programs that assumes that input can never fail.  Both of these
> processes are spinning in loops attempting to read from a revoked
> terminal and ignoring the resulting error return.

Does that also explain why I *often* get talk to just freeze up
when I use it over a prolonged period of time (say, > 10 min?)
and large internet distances (Dallas -> San Jose, in about 15 hops)?
It will just no longer echo input to either side although it
is properly buffering.  After oh, a minute or five, it may come
back and resume normal operation.  Sometimes, it's just dead.

I've been blaming it on a really lousy ISP link in CA, but I'm
not too sure anymore...

jdl