mesg(1)                                                             mesg(1)

NAME
     mesg - permit or deny messages

SYNOPSIS
     mesg [y|n]

DESCRIPTION
     mesg allows you to control whether other users can send messages to
     your terminal. You can use mesg either to simply check the status of
     your terminal or to grant or deny other users the permission to use
     write to write messages to your terminal.

OPTIONS
     No argument specified:
         mesg reports the current setting for your terminal and returns an
         exit status of 0 if messages may be sent to it, or 1 if they can-
         not.

     y   Grants other users permission to write messages to your terminal.

         This corresponds to the old argument -y which is still supported.

     n   Denies other users permission to write messages to your terminal.
         Messages sent via wall or write by the system administrator over-
         ride this denial.

         This corresponds to the old argument -n which is still supported.

EXIT STATUS
     0   Messages are receivable

     1   Messages are not receivable

     >1  Error

LOCALE
     The LCMESSAGES environment variable governs the language in which
     message texts are displayed. If LCMESSAGES is undefined or is defined
     as the null string, it defaults to the value of LANG. If LANG is like-
     wise undefined or null, the system acts as if it were not internation-
     alized.

     The LCALL environment variable governs the entire locale. LCALL
     takes precedence over all the other environment variables which affect
     internationalization.










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mesg(1)                                                             mesg(1)

EXAMPLES

     Example 1

     User heidi, who is logged in at terminal tty001, checks the current
     setting for this terminal:

     $ mesg
     is n

     Messages are not receivable at terminal tty001. Thus no messages can
     be sent to heidi while she is working at terminal tty001:

     $ write heidi
     Permission denied

     Example 2

     heidi can change the setting at terminal tty01 by entering:

     $ mesg y

FILES
     /dev/tty*
     /dev/term/tty*
          files containing terminal-specific information

SEE ALSO
     talk(1), tty(1), write(1), wall(1M).

























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