I regularly get talk requests when I log in to Grex, however, I've
never once been able to answer them.
        When I get a "talk" request, I keep getting interrupted with 2 line
messages explaining how to answer.  I've tried "!talk user" and "!talk
user@grex" but I always get [Your party is refusing messages].

89 responses total.

I use write.

Hmm...  I've used talk successfully here.  "!talk user" is the proper
way to respond.  Maybe it's the case that if someone has their write-
perms turned off but you have yours on, they can send a request but
you can't respond -- same way it is with the vanilla "write" program.

You *do* use the user's id, not "user", right?

Yeah, if they have their perms set to OFF, then you'll get that
error message.  Confused me the first time I saw it.

I thought you were supposed to say just 'talk' to answer the request.

Then the question is why they're trying to talk to *him* with their
permissions off.

One way communications ;)

Also, doesn't talk only work with smart terminals?  I've had to
switch to "chat" when someone without a smart terminal requested
a talk.  Is there some way the programs could be smarter?  For
example, if someone tried to "talk" to someone with a dumb termcap, he
or she would be give a message, "Oops. Can't 'talk' try 'chat'"

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Yep, that looks to be the problem.  If you want things to work
properly on Grex, make sure /usr/local/bin is *before* any of the
system directories, sush as /bin, /usr/bin, and /usr/ucb.  You
also don't need /usr/umb in there; that's an M-Netism.  And
having "." first in your path is an invitation to disaster.

Grex's talk program does not work for anyone who doesn't have fancy terminal
settings.  If you dare to try, you get one character per line scrolling
rapidly up the side of your screen.  You have to be some kind of UNIX hacker
to change it.  (Chris Dailey helped me with mine, but I still can't
understand what he did.)

Your communications software must be emulating a vt100 terminal or
something similar.  Looks like he changed your .profile to tell Unix
that you're a vt100.  (Look at the line that begins with 'tset'.)

Basically, 'talk' is a split-screen program that puts your typing
in one half of the screen, the other person's in the others, and
allows both people to type at the same time.  To function successfully,
it has to know how to clear the screen and position the cursor on
your terminal, hence Unix has to know what kind of terminal you are,
as the commands to do this differ from one terminal to another.
Wouldn't really call it "fancy" -- it'll work with any comm.
program that can emulate a vt100, ansi, or other "smart" terminal,
and that includes just about all of them these days.

For a system connected to the internet, 'talk' also lets you talk
to people on other systems.

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This might be simply a brute force kludge, ... but ... write loginid -c
has never failed me here or anywhere else. 
  
All the fancy stuff is neat-o, however the kiss theory also
applies.     I also *much* prefer to see the contact coming in
at a character-by-character rate instead of line-by-line.

(remmers), how does talk let you talk to people on other systems?

Same way it works here - only you use the full address.  Of course, that
won't work on Grex, because we aren't on the internet, so we don't 
communicate directly with other systems.  

I have never much liked !talk.  All that cursor jumping makes me seasick,
and I've never seen the advantage of being able to start typing while the
other person is still typing.  You don't start talking while the other
person is talking, and besides, I'm usually too busy trying to catch what
the other person is saying to write coherently at the same time.

        Thank; I've fixed my path.

re #16:  Suit yourself..  I love talk and find it worlds better than write..

Is there another place around here that is on the "internet" that you
can talk to people far awy on?

Not for free.

  #19:  There are some available, however, if you're a student... Both
EMU and U of M have request accounts on some of their systems...  Just
request an account on a Unix system (note: NOT MTS), and compile talk
there (if it isn't already compiled)...

 ... first finding the sources, knowing about makefiles, determining the
necessary options for that system, and editing the sources to fix anything
that's left over after all that.  Thanks a heap, Russ; I think you'd want
to make sure talk is already there if you need to ask this question.

Obviously, you can only talk to someone who's logged in somewhere at the
time, BTW

  Talk is pretty standard on Berkeley Unix..  Most Suns, Decs, and some 
other systems will have it by default.

I read all of the above again, and "came out by the same door wherein I
went" - i.e., it didn't learn anything useful. I was just editing a
response, and was interrupted by a two line messge, that ended with
"respond talk <user>". I didn't know *precisely* what to do. It was still
at an edit prompt, but I tried with "talk <user>", with no effect. I tried
just a "return", with no effect. So I tried to list what I was working on,
and it did, so I erased the garbage, and finished the editing. WHAT
SHOULD I have done (and what would have been the result)?

   I don't know which editor you were in, but if you get a talk...
request when you're doing something else, you can type !talk person
and that will run the talk program.  Your current edit session would
be put on hold, and you'd see the screen clear and the phrase [connected]
up at the top of the screen.  Talk gives you a split screen; what you type
is on the top, what the other person does is on the bottom.  When you're
done talking, a control-D will terminate talk and you'll be back to
whatever you were doing.

Joe says if your entering a response at a > prompt you should do
a :!talk <user>.

   Yes; if you're entering a response, that works too.

Oh, hi Suzie!

Re 19 - I help run a system in town (Msen) that has public access Internet,
which would let you "talk" people from far away.  The other cool thing
there is "irc", which is kind of like party with 1000 people all over
the globe.

It's not free though (sigh), costs $20/mo.  I have an item in classified
with the details.

(It would be mighty nice to get grex on the Internet...)

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 what command is needed to get out of talk??? I was talking with senor Curl
the other night, and could not break out of it.

Type your interrupt character.  Your .login file indicates that it's
control-C.  (The eof character control-D that you use for "write"
doesn't work in "talk".)

Did you *ever* get disconnected, Jim ;->? I saw you using ctrl-this'n'that,
so lucked onto ~C. 

re 29:  What would it cost for a system such as grex to use
        msen?
        

I think MSEN charges $250/month for a dedicated line, plus the cost of
another phone line and modem on Grex's end.

to put grex on the internet I'd guess would be about $175/mo.  That would
be an "MsenLink Plus" account, which gives you a single machine on the
Internet and a login on our modem pool for dial-up IP.  If you wanted to
put the whole gaggle of grex machines (grex, nos, and whatever follows)
it would be $250/mo, and if you wanted your own phone line all to your
very own instead of hitting our modem pool it's $350/mo.

it sounds like grex would just about have to double its membership to
cover the costs...which I suspect is well within the bounds of reason.

Doubling our membership would also have to cover some other increased costs.
But I would hope that an internet link would also be an attraction.
It certainly seems within the bounds of possibility; I'd say not the
immediate future, but not necessarily the distant future either.

Thanks for the info, as I'm sure I'm not the only one with no idea what it
would take.

   Prices are apparently also going down fairly fast (at least from what
I hear!), so maybe in another year or something we'll be able to handle it.
That would be nice!!!

   It would be nice.  I think its doable.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss