Help with console program

How can I create a console program that simultaneously handles input from the user, and outputs text? I tried creating a sample program with two threads, one basically did something like

Code:

---

while (true) { getline(cin, somestring ); }

---

and the other thread randomly slept and wrote to the console. The problem was that when I begain to write input, the output function (which just cout-ed a string) cut off the text I had written so far. I would like behavior that simply "pushes" what I'm writing to the bottom line, and every time I cout something, it will appear above that, so the last line in the console will be reserved for user input, never touched by the output text.

This can be windows specific, as I am not working with any other operating system.

Thanks in advance.

Why would you want to do this? With out any context we really can't help you.

This is a little program that outputs a " --- " in every 3 seconds and at the same time it takes input.

Code:

---

#include <iostream>
#include <windows.h>
#include <process.h>

void thread(void *P){
        while(true){
                Sleep(3000);
                printf(" --- ");
        }
}

int main(){
        char buffer[256];
        _beginthread(thread,0,NULL);
        while(buffer[0]!='*'){
                std::cin.getline(buffer,256,'\n');
        }
        return 0;
}

---

Thank you for your replies.

maxorator, I'm glad that you immediately knew what I wanted :) , but I have tried that approach and it has a problem. Start the program and type hello, as the "---" outputs it cuts off your input, and if you want to write something long, you won't have enough time.

The use is for instance a program which gives the user status about something evey once in a while, but allows the user to always input some commands at any time he wants.
(i.e. a thread starts to do some calculations, but the user can input the commands pause, stop at anytime)

It is like this in many console programs that I have seen, so it should not be such a problem