[ruby-talk:00210] Get character with no wait

What is the best way to do a getc without waiting; so I can try to grab
it in a loop where i am also sending characters (e.g. in an irc program,
where I am grabbing input from a socket while sending characters from
the console).  I'd rather not do it with threads in the interest of
portability, but if it's the best solution, I'd like to know.

-Gabriel Emerson
 <[e-mail]>