xref: /freebsd/usr.bin/talk/talk.1 (revision f5463265955b829775bbb32e1fd0bc11dafc36ce)
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28.Dd January 21, 2010
29.Dt TALK 1
30.Os
31.Sh NAME
32.Nm talk
33.Nd talk to another user
34.Sh SYNOPSIS
35.Nm
36.Ar person
37.Op Ar ttyname
38.Sh DESCRIPTION
39The
40.Nm
41utility is a visual communication program which copies lines from your
42terminal to that of another user.
43.Pp
44Options available:
45.Bl -tag -width ttyname
46.It Ar person
47If you wish to talk to someone on your own machine, then
48.Ar person
49is just the person's login name.
50If you wish to talk to a user on
51another host, then
52.Ar person
53is of the form
54.Ql user@host
55or
56.Ql host!user
57or
58.Ql host:user .
59.It Ar ttyname
60If you wish to talk to a user who is logged in more than once, the
61.Ar ttyname
62argument may be used to indicate the appropriate terminal
63name, where
64.Ar ttyname
65is of the form
66.Ql ttyXX .
67.El
68.Pp
69When first called,
70.Nm
71sends the message
72.Bd -literal -offset indent -compact
73Message from TalkDaemon@his_machine...
74talk: connection requested by your_name@your_machine.
75talk: respond with: talk your_name@your_machine
76.Ed
77.Pp
78to the user you wish to talk to.
79At this point, the recipient
80of the message should reply by typing
81.Pp
82.Dl talk \ your_name@your_machine
83.Pp
84It does not matter from which machine the recipient replies, as
85long as his login-name is the same.
86Once communication is established,
87the two parties may type simultaneously, with their output appearing
88in separate windows.
89Typing control-L
90.Ql ^L
91will cause the screen to
92be reprinted.
93Typing control-D
94.Ql ^D
95will clear both parts of your screen to be cleared, while
96the control-D character will be sent to the remote side
97(and just displayed by this
98.Nm
99client).
100Your erase, kill, and word kill characters will
101behave normally.
102To exit, just type your interrupt character;
103.Nm
104then moves the cursor to the bottom of the screen and restores the
105terminal to its previous state.
106.Pp
107Permission to talk may be denied or granted by use of the
108.Xr mesg 1
109command.
110At the outset talking is allowed.
111.Sh FILES
112.Bl -tag -width /var/run/utx.active -compact
113.It Pa /etc/hosts
114to find the recipient's machine
115.It Pa /var/run/utx.active
116to find the recipient's tty
117.El
118.Sh SEE ALSO
119.Xr mail 1 ,
120.Xr mesg 1 ,
121.Xr wall 1 ,
122.Xr who 1 ,
123.Xr write 1 ,
124.Xr talkd 8
125.Sh HISTORY
126The
127.Nm
128command appeared in
129.Bx 4.2 .
130.Pp
131In
132.Fx 5.3 ,
133the default behaviour of
134.Nm
135was changed to treat local-to-local talk requests as originating
136and terminating at
137.Em localhost .
138Before this change, it was required that the hostname (as per
139.Xr gethostname 3 )
140resolved to a valid IPv4 address (via
141.Xr gethostbyname 3 ) ,
142making
143.Nm
144unsuitable for use in configurations where
145.Xr talkd 8
146was bound to the loopback interface (normally for security reasons).
147.Sh BUGS
148The version of
149.Nm
150released with
151.Bx 4.3
152uses a protocol that
153is incompatible with the protocol used in the version released with
154.Bx 4.2 .
155.Pp
156Multibyte characters are not recognized.
157