You're right that it doesn't matter if it's a file or not per se.
What matters - and what the file interface gets you, but you can do the same thing in many other ways - is introducing the concept of a generic pluggable, chainable API.
What matters - and what the file interface gets you, but you can do the same thing in many other ways - is introducing the concept of a generic pluggable, chainable API.
At that point it doesn't really matter if the screen is a file or not -- you need a compressor that can easily provide the output on a network socket, and a client that can perform the decoding.