Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!smsc.sony.com!dce
From: dce@smsc.sony.com (David Elliott)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.misc
Subject: Re: Login vs. typeahead
Message-ID: <1990Nov15.214753.12648@smsc.sony.com>
Date: 15 Nov 90 21:47:53 GMT
References: <1990Nov13.182623.18967@smsc.sony.com> <71572@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> <1990Nov13.235307.9263@athena.mit.edu> <1980.2741165d@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com>
Sender: dce@smsc.sony.com (David Elliott)
Reply-To: dce@smsc.sony.com (David Elliott)
Organization: Sony Microsystems, San Jose, CA
Lines: 39


In article <1980.2741165d@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com>, herrickd@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com writes:
|> In article <1990Nov13.235307.9263@athena.mit.edu>, jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens) writes:
|> > In article <71572@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu>, speelmo@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (Lance Speelmon -- UCS) writes:
|> > |> The machines that we have here also act the same way.  I don't think
|> > |> that there is any way to change that.  I could be wrong though.
|> > 
|> >   If you really want to change it, which (as I said in my previous posting) is
|> > probably a bad idea, it is easy to do so as long as you have source code.  You
|> > change the getpass() routine in the C library so that it uses TIOCSETN instead
|> > of TIOCSETP when doing the ioctl to turn off echoing.
|> 
|> But this does not fix the problem, only changes it.  You need to also
|> dig into the program that reads the username and turn off echo so the
|> beginning of the password does not appear on the terminal.

Jonathon's solution really doesn't fix the "problem" for us, since we're
using SVR4, though the idea is sound.

Even modifying ttymon (SVR4 version of getty) doesn't quite solve the
problem correctly.  After all, not every login requires a password,
so you have to make sure to put the tty back correctly.  Also, there's
nothing that says that ttymon/getty has to execute login, so you have
to solve that peoblem.  Oh, and you have to deal with the case where
the line already had echo turned off in the first place.

It seems to me that to really fix this right (assuming it's a correct
thing to "fix" in the first place) you need to write a ttymon/getty with
the login session handling integrated into it, or move all prompting
into login.

My solution so far has been to tell the people that asked to use xdm
when they use X.  This fixes the problem in that specific case.

-- 
...David Elliott
...dce@smsc.sony.com | ...!{uunet,mips}!sonyusa!dce
...(408)944-4073
..."Help me!  Moon-men have my socks... over..." - Al