  FAM, the File Alteration Monitor, provides an API which applications
can use to be notified when specific files or directories are changed.

  FAM comes in two parts: famd, the daemon which listens for requests and
delivers notification, and libfam, a library which client applications can
use to communicate with FAM.

  If the monitored files are mounted from a remote host, the local FAM
will attempt to contact FAM on the remote host, and will pass the requests
on to the remote FAM.

  FAM can also notify its clients when a file starts and stops execution.
(The IRIX Interactive Desktop uses this to change a program's icon while
it's running, for example.)

  FAM was originally written for IRIX in 1989 by Bruce Karsh, and was
rewritten in 1995 by Bob Miller.  This open-source release of FAM builds
and runs on NetBSD, FreeBSD, Linux, and IRIX, and is the same FAM that
will be included with IRIX 6.5.8.
