xref: /freebsd/usr.bin/talk/talk.1 (revision cbb3ec25236ba72f91cbdf23f8b78b9d1af0cedf)
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28.\"     @(#)talk.1	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93
29.\"
30.Dd January 21, 2010
31.Dt TALK 1
32.Os
33.Sh NAME
34.Nm talk
35.Nd talk to another user
36.Sh SYNOPSIS
37.Nm
38.Ar person
39.Op Ar ttyname
40.Sh DESCRIPTION
41The
42.Nm
43utility is a visual communication program which copies lines from your
44terminal to that of another user.
45.Pp
46Options available:
47.Bl -tag -width ttyname
48.It Ar person
49If you wish to talk to someone on your own machine, then
50.Ar person
51is just the person's login name.
52If you wish to talk to a user on
53another host, then
54.Ar person
55is of the form
56.Ql user@host
57or
58.Ql host!user
59or
60.Ql host:user .
61.It Ar ttyname
62If you wish to talk to a user who is logged in more than once, the
63.Ar ttyname
64argument may be used to indicate the appropriate terminal
65name, where
66.Ar ttyname
67is of the form
68.Ql ttyXX .
69.El
70.Pp
71When first called,
72.Nm
73sends the message
74.Bd -literal -offset indent -compact
75Message from TalkDaemon@his_machine...
76talk: connection requested by your_name@your_machine.
77talk: respond with: talk your_name@your_machine
78.Ed
79.Pp
80to the user you wish to talk to.
81At this point, the recipient
82of the message should reply by typing
83.Pp
84.Dl talk \ your_name@your_machine
85.Pp
86It does not matter from which machine the recipient replies, as
87long as his login-name is the same.
88Once communication is established,
89the two parties may type simultaneously, with their output appearing
90in separate windows.
91Typing control-L
92.Ql ^L
93will cause the screen to
94be reprinted.
95Typing control-D
96.Ql ^D
97will clear both parts of your screen to be cleared, while
98the control-D character will be sent to the remote side
99(and just displayed by this
100.Nm
101client).
102Your erase, kill, and word kill characters will
103behave normally.
104To exit, just type your interrupt character;
105.Nm
106then moves the cursor to the bottom of the screen and restores the
107terminal to its previous state.
108.Pp
109Permission to talk may be denied or granted by use of the
110.Xr mesg 1
111command.
112At the outset talking is allowed.
113.Sh FILES
114.Bl -tag -width /var/run/utx.active -compact
115.It Pa /etc/hosts
116to find the recipient's machine
117.It Pa /var/run/utx.active
118to find the recipient's tty
119.El
120.Sh SEE ALSO
121.Xr mail 1 ,
122.Xr mesg 1 ,
123.Xr wall 1 ,
124.Xr who 1 ,
125.Xr write 1 ,
126.Xr talkd 8
127.Sh HISTORY
128The
129.Nm
130command appeared in
131.Bx 4.2 .
132.Pp
133In
134.Fx 5.3 ,
135the default behaviour of
136.Nm
137was changed to treat local-to-local talk requests as originating
138and terminating at
139.Em localhost .
140Before this change, it was required that the hostname (as per
141.Xr gethostname 3 )
142resolved to a valid IPv4 address (via
143.Xr gethostbyname 3 ) ,
144making
145.Nm
146unsuitable for use in configurations where
147.Xr talkd 8
148was bound to the loopback interface (normally for security reasons).
149.Sh BUGS
150The version of
151.Nm
152released with
153.Bx 4.3
154uses a protocol that
155is incompatible with the protocol used in the version released with
156.Bx 4.2 .
157.Pp
158Multibyte characters are not recognized.
159