Yes, OK. Maybe they mean select(). A quick search indicates select() and poll() are similar, if not identical on some systems.
That's OK, you set up file descriptors that you are interested, and then do a select() call, waiting for an event, or a timeout.
However that's still not quite the same thing as asynchronously getting an interrupt. Eg. calculating some big thing, but getting promptly interrupted if a switch is closed.
I suppose my question is: If this is a small Unix box, running Linux, why bother putting little pins down the side to connect hardware to? Using your model, Jack, we should be connecting things via USB, with an appropriate device driver, and use high-level abstraction to hide the implementation details from the program.
But if it is more like a "high powered Arduino", which not get interrupts directly?