Features
MGR provided each client window with:
- termcap-style terminal control functions, graphics primitives such as line and circle drawing;
- facilities for manipulating bitmaps, fonts, icons, and pop-up menus;
- commands to reshape and position windows; and a message passing facility enabling client programs to rendezvous and exchange messages. Client programs may ask to be informed when a change in the window system occurs, such as a reshaped window, a pushed mouse button, or a message sent from another client program. These changes are called events. MGR notifies a client program of an event by sending it an ASCII character string in a format specified by the client program. Existing applications can be integrated into the windowing environment without modification by having MGR imitate keystrokes in response to user defined menu selections or other events.
All these features worked equally well if the client program was executing on the same computer as the MGR server or if the client was executed on a remote computer. The type of connection was insignificant. You could use telnet over TCP/IP or a modem dial-up connection equally well, for instance.
External programs such as Stephen Uhler's own MTX and Howard Chu's rmgr made it possible to multiplex several windows over a single connection to a remote host, even using a normal modem dial-up connection.
A later feature, $HOME MOVIE, made it possible to record user interaction for later display.
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