You cant get there from here...

Because I had to have AVL support ANY terminal types, yet still needed
timeouts, I had to use QIOW's for the inputs.  The QIO's are to the
terminal, and a file isnt a terminal.  I'd have to write the program using
FAB's (file access blocks) and RAB's (record access blocks) which would more
than quadruple the code... at least thats what the systems folks tell me.  I
think I could do it with a call to SMG$READ_COMPOSED_LINE, which allows for
timeouts and doesnt do anything thats terminal specific.  I'll try to get
around to it next week or so.  I tried using a .COM file with another 
program that uses SMG$READ_COMPOSED_LINE and it worked.