[net.emacs] communications with non-daughter processes from gnu emacs

michaelm@bcsaic.UUCP (michael b maxwell) (11/05/85)

I'm new to emacs, so if this is obvious...

The question:  is it possible for gnu emacs to send a string or region to a
process which emacs didn't start?

The background: gnu emacs 16.56, BSD 4.2, a Sun II running version 2.x
of their system, Frantz Lisp 38.xx.

Details:  I set up some windows on my Sun using "suntools".  One of these
windows is running Lisp; at least one of the other windows will be running
emacs.  So the Lisp process isn't a daughter processes of emacs, as it
would be if I started it up with "shell."  I'd like to be able to send 
stuff (sexprs) from the emacs window to the Lisp process.  It would be nice if 
I could send stuff from multiple emacs's in different windows.

Why do I want to do this?  I *could* set up my whole screen to be one giant
emacs process, and use emacs to set up the subwindows.  But one of my
windows (the lisp one) has a graphics canvas in addition to the tty...
Besides, the Sun windows are mouse selectable.  (By the way, is there any 
way to get gnu emacs to pay attention to the Sun mouse?)

Ideas: The entry in "Command Summary for Gnu Emacs" for process-status
mentions something about "external" processes.  Is this what I want?
How do I set up an i/o channel between such a process and emacs? 
-- 
Mike Maxwell
Boeing Artificial Intelligence Center
	...uw-beaver!uw-june!bcsaic!michaelm