>> 	How about checking if the stdin is a tty and defaulting to
>> 	'no command line completion & no progress meter' if not?
>
>This seems to me like it would be a reasonable thing to do. I can't
>think of why it would ever matter, but perhaps the commandline
>completion should be turned of if stdin isn't a tty, and the progress
>meter should be turned off if std*out* isn't a tty.

won't work.  sorry.  emacs, in its attempts to be all-encompassingly
nice (won't get me wrong, i use it all the time :) actually runs ftp
off a pty.

so...maybe check to see if ftp's parent is emacs??!

bleah!

better to have ftp check to see if it's a "session leader" (which it
is if it's the only thing running on a pty which is the way emacs
leaves it).  icky, but it'll work.  (and completely nonsensical to
maintainers who don't use emacs or ange-ftp).

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