From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Aug 26 13:23:51 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3EC0316A4BF for ; Tue, 26 Aug 2003 13:23:51 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mail-relay1.mirrorimage.net (mail-relay1.mirrorimage.net [209.58.140.11]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 24AEE43FDD for ; Tue, 26 Aug 2003 13:23:48 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from leblanc@mirrorimage.net) Received: from leblanc.mirrorimage.net (leblanc.mirrorimage.net [209.192.210.146]) by mail-relay1.mirrorimage.net (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id QAA23648 for ; Tue, 26 Aug 2003 16:23:38 -0400 Received: from leblanc.mirrorimage.net (localhost [127.0.0.1]) h7QKNndO086941 for ; Tue, 26 Aug 2003 16:23:49 -0400 (EDT) (envelope-from leblanc@leblanc.mirrorimage.net) Received: (from leblanc@localhost) by leblanc.mirrorimage.net (8.12.8p1/8.12.8/Submit) id h7QKNne9086940 for questions@freebsd.org; Tue, 26 Aug 2003 16:23:49 -0400 (EDT) Date: Tue, 26 Aug 2003 16:23:49 -0400 From: Louis LeBlanc To: questions@freebsd.org Message-ID: <20030826202349.GE70787@keyslapper.org> Mail-Followup-To: questions@freebsd.org References: <20030825163744.GA61150@keyslapper.org> <20030825180255.GB8753@webserver> <20030826202002.GA243@webserver> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit In-Reply-To: <20030826202002.GA243@webserver> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.4i Subject: Re: motd question X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list Reply-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 26 Aug 2003 20:23:51 -0000 On 08/26/03 01:20 PM, Joshua Oreman sat at the `puter and typed: > On Mon, Aug 25, 2003 at 11:02:55AM -0700 or thereabouts, Joshua Oreman wrote: > > On Mon, Aug 25, 2003 at 12:37:44PM -0400 or thereabouts, Louis LeBlanc wrote: > > > Probably not possible, but I was wondering (and have for some > > > time, though I can't find any info on it either way) whether > > > /etc/motd is strictly a text in/text out file, or if there is a > > > way to get it to execute a command, the output of which is to be > > > included in the text output? > > > > You could make it a FIFO and put a Perl script or something at the > > other end, if you want dynamically-generated output. [ ... ] Be > > careful. > > Really! This approach can come back and bite you in the butt. > Basically, be absolutely sure the writer process is started during > bootup. Otherwise it'll hang indefinitely when logging in; you need > to drop to single-user to fix it. Yeah, I really just wanted to get the output of an alias, but it's not important enough to go through all that for. I just figured it would be a pretty cool - although quite geeky thing to have the real time printed out with each login: The alias is as follows: $ gtime Right now, the official U.S. time is: 16:20:43 Tuesday, August 26, 2003 and it's expansion is: $ alias gtime alias gtime='lynx -dump http://www.time.gov/timezone.cgi?Eastern/d/-5 | head -5' Pretty interesting, but definitely not worth the hassle that would obviously be required. Thanks for the feedback everyone. Lou -- Louis LeBlanc leblanc@keyslapper.org Fully Funded Hobbyist, KeySlapper Extrordinaire :) http://www.keyslapper.org ԿԬ QOTD: "It's sort of a threat, you see. I've never been very good at them myself, but I'm told they can be very effective."