Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!amdcad!ames!ucbcad!ucbvax!cbosgd!osu-cis!tut!lvc
From: lvc@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Lawrence V. Cipriani)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Want login shell to timeout after 15 mins.
Message-ID: <3723@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>
Date: 3 Jan 88 23:46:43 GMT
References: <3341@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu> <176@conexch.UUCP>
Organization: Ohio State Computer & Info Science
Lines: 26
Keywords: Sys-V, idle, logout
Summary: TMOUT works only at PS1


	previous quotation deleted
>  
> There are several ways to do this.  The simplest is to get a copy of the
> Korn Shell which supports an environment variable, TMOUT, which if set to
> a value greater than zero, will terminate the shell if a command
> is not entered within the prescribed number of seconds.  You
> could set the value of this variable in /etc/profile and then set
> it to read-only status to prevent users from changing it.

The TMOUT variable only works at PS1.  If ksh waits at any other read
it will wait forever.  For example just type a \ at PS1, ksh prints PS2
and will wait forever.  Setting it to read only isn't much help either
since a user can type the command: ksh and set TMOUT for that subshell
to whatever value he or she desires.  Also you can just type in a command
like cat or dc without any arguments and sit all day.  This is why you
have to resort to programs to kill off users.

> Here is a copy of a shell program that was published in Unix
> World magazine recently.  It will log out idle users:

Thanks for the program!

-- 
	Larry Cipriani AT&T Network Systems at
	cbosgd!osu-cis!tut!lvc Ohio State University