sysline(1) sysline(1)NAME sysline - displays the system status on the status line of a terminal SYNOPSIS sysline [+seconds] [-b] [-c] [-d] [-D] [-e] [-h] [-H remote] [-i] [-j] [-l] [-m] [-p] [-q] [-r] [-s] ARGUMENTS +seconds Specifies the interval (in seconds) in which the status line is updated. The default is 60 seconds. -b Beeps once every half hour and twice every hour, just like those obnoxious watches you keep hearing. -c Clears the status line for 5 seconds before each redisplay. -d Debugs and prints status line data in human-readable format. -D Prints out the current day/date before the time. -e Prints out only the information. Does not print out the control commands necessary to put the information on the bottom line. This option is useful for putting the output of sysline onto the mode line of an emacs window. -h Prints out the host machine's name after the time. -H remote Prints the load average on the remote host remote. If the host is down, or is not sending out rwhod packets, then the down time is printed instead. -i Prints out the process ID of the sysline process onto standard output upon startup. With this information you can send the alarm signal to the sysline process to cause it to update immediately. sysline writes to the standard error, so you can redirect the standard output into a file to catch the process id. -j Forces the sysline output to be left-justified even on terminals capable of cursor movement on the status line. -l Does not print the names of people who log in and out. -m Does not check for mail. January 1992 1
sysline(1) sysline(1)-p Does not report the number of processes, which are runnable and suspended. -q Does not print out diagnostic messages if something goes wrong when starting up. -r Does not display in reverse video. -s Prints ``short'' form of line by left-justifying. iff escapes are not allowed in the status line. Some terminals (the tvi's and Freedom 100's, for example) do not allow cursor movement (or other ``intelligent'' operations) in the status line. For these terminals, sysline normally uses blanks to cause right- justification. This option will disable the adding of the blanks. DESCRIPTION sysline runs in the background and periodically displays system status information on the status line of the terminal. Not all terminals have a status line. Those that do include the h19, c108, aaa, vt100, tvi925/tvi950, and Freedom 100. Of these, only the h19 termcap entry supports the status line. Note: The Macintosh monitor does not have a status line. If no options are given, sysline displays the time of day, the current load average, the change in load average in the last 5 minutes, the number of users (followed by u), the number of runnable processes (followed by r), the number of suspended processes (followed by s), and the users who have logged on and off since the last status report. Finally, if new mail has arrived, a summary of it is printed. If there is unread mail in your mailbox, an asterisk will appear after the display of the number of users. The display is normally in reverse video (if your terminal supports this in the status line) and is right-justified to reduce distraction. Every fifth display is done in normal video to give the screen a chance to rest. If you have a file named .who in your home directory, then the contents of that file are printed first. One common use of this feature is to alias chdir, pushd, and popd to place the current directory stack in ~/.who after it changes the new directory. If you have a file .syslinelock in your home directory, then sysline will not update its statistics and write on your screen; it will just go to sleep for a minute. This is 2 January 1992
sysline(1) sysline(1)useful if you want to disable sysline momentarily. Note that it may take a few seconds from the time the lock file is created until you are guaranteed that sysline will not write on the screen. LIMITATIONS If you interrupt the display, you may find your cursor missing or stuck on the status line. The best thing to do is to reset the terminal. If there is too much for one line, the excess is thrown away. FILES /usr/ucb/sysline Executable file /etc/termcap Terminal capabilities file /etc/utmp File containing names of people who are logged in /dev/kmem File containing process table /usr/spool/rwho/whod.* File containing who/uptime information for remote hosts ${HOME}/.who File containing information to print on bottom line ${HOME}/.syslinelock Lock file; when it exists, sysline will not print. SEE ALSO ps(1) pstat(1M) in A/UX System Administrator's Reference January 1992 3