On Friday 27 June 2003 13:29, Lucas Peet wrote:
> Sorry again for the top-post - one word: Outlook.
>
> Anyhow, what it seems he's after is a simple script that, like he says,
> outputs text to the terminal via cron.  Not that hard.  A simple 'echo'
> or 'printf', as mentioned before would be sufficient.  He's just after a
> starting place, so nothing schmancy (reading a config file, etc...) He
> can edit the script to change what is output by hand right now (I
> think).
>
> Thing is...how would you accomplish this with either echo or printf, but
> having the script only output to a 'live' terminal - one that is
> currently logged into, so the text isn't output to the other 7 (or
> fewer) vterms that are still sitting at a login: prompt?

write (man write) is the command he'll want to use.  Why reinvent the wheel?  
wall was also mentioned earier -- think of it as write all.

> Seems to me this would have to test whether the terminal is active or
> logged into, then write directly to the terminal via the char device in
> /dev.  Guess you could check /proc for active terminals, then write
> directly to them...but I don't know how this would be accomplished in
> Perl with printf or some such.

Again, why reinvent the wheel?  write does this for you.