# yes, we need a way to flush the file on disconnect; i don't know one
# yes, that's flush is not atomic (but good enough for me)
ssh remote.system.somewhere "tail -n 10 .irssi/fnotify ; : > .irssi/fnotify ; tail -f .irssi/fnotify " | sed -u 's/[<@&]//g' | while read heading message  do  notify-send -i gtk-dialog-info -t 300000 -- "${heading}" "${message}"; done # the sed -u 's/[<@&]//g' is needed as those characters might confuse  notify-send