Possible problem with GNU libc & Linux 2.2.X ? (fwd)

[Jan Rafaj <Jan dot Rafaj at cedric dot vabo dot cz>]

Hello,

Mr. Drepper, who has been involved in GLIBC development, has instructed
me to send you this message. So here it is.

Best regards,

Jan

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 13 Sep 2000 13:13:02 +0200 (MEST)
From: Jan Rafaj <Jan.Rafaj@cedric.vabo.cz>
To: drepper@cygnus.com
Cc: Jan Rafaj <rafaj@cedric.vabo.cz>
Subject: Possible problem with GNU libc & Linux 2.2.X ?


Mr. Drepper,

First, please excuse me for disturbing you, and also please excuse
my immature english (its not my native language)..

Recently, while trying to get a program to work on system equipped
with Linux 2.2.17, configured NOT TO USE Unix98 ttys, and glibc-2.1.3,
I've faced this problem:

The function ttyname(0) returns just "/dev/tty" for ordinary user,
while for root, it returns the real tty he's connected through.
On systems with the same equipement, but kernel compiled to
_USE_ Unix98 ttys, the ttyname(0) ALWAYS returns the real tty name
user is connected via, no matter of what kind of user. On the same
system, equipped with old libc5 library, this problem does not occur
as well - ttyname(0) always returns real tty name.

The program I've run into troubles with, is screen-3.9.8 that uses
ttyname(0) to find out about current tty. Due to ( bug, feature ?) above,
for ordinary user, it always returns just "/dev/tty" and therefore,
user is not able to reattach already detached screen session.

Call me stupid or anything, but please, can you tell me, is the
described problem a feature or bug of GLIBC ? In the latter case,
can it be corrected anytime soon ?

Thanks for your time, willingness and understanding.

Hoping for your response,

Jan

---
Bc. Jan Rafaj
mail: rafaj@vabo.cz