Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!auspex!guy
From: guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Can't log in right on console to accounts in CAPS.
Message-ID: <7758@auspex.auspex.com>
Date: 12 May 91 17:47:29 GMT
References: <26859@adm.brl.mil>
Organization: Auspex Systems, Santa Clara
Lines: 41

>I think the login programs checks for uppercase accounts on consoles (although
>I'm not sure).

No, it's "getty" that checks for uppercase accounts; "getty" isn't
involved in "rlogin" or "telnet", which is why, when you log in over the
Ethernet, the system doesn't assume you're stuck with an uppercase-only
terminal, but when you log in on the console, which does involve
"getty", it does.

"getty" does so on most UNIX systems.  The theory is that 1) nobody
would create an account with capital letters on a UNIX system, because
it doesn't buy you much and obliges you to use the shift key to refer to
the name of the account and 2) given that, the system can assume that,
if you type capital letters to "getty"s prompt, it's because you're on
an uppercase-only terminal, in which case it maps the upper-case letters
to lower-case on input and puts the tty driver in "this is an
uppercase-only terminal" mode, which means that upper-case letters typed
on input are turned into lower-case letters (unless preceded by a
backslash), lower-case letters generated on output are turned into
upper-case letters, and upper-case letters generated on output are
preceded with a backslash to distinguish them from lower-case letters. 
In addition, some special characters (e.g., '{' and '}') that are often
not present on upper-case only ("half-ASCII") terminals are also mapped
to '\(' and '\)' on output, and supported on input as '\(' and '\)' as
well.

>I'm pretty sure this once worked.

I'm pretty sure you're mistaken, unless you were running a "getty" that
can have that feature disabled, and had disabled it...

>Any ideas?

Try turning the "lc" capability on in the "/etc/gettytab" entries used
by the console and for all the other "real" terminals on your machine;
it should tell the system that those terminals support lower-case and
that an upper-case letter from that terminal is supposed to be an
upper-case letter.

Or don't create accounts with ALL-CAPS names, as UNIX, as one person
said, "tends not to listen when you shout at it".