Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!ucsd!ucsdhub!hp-sdd!ncr-sd!ncrlnk!wright!eve!dcourte
From: dcourte@eve.wright.edu (Dale Courte)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.encore
Subject: telnet/rlogin "bouncing"
Message-ID: <1052@thor.wright.EDU>
Date: 6 Feb 90 21:50:04 GMT
Sender: news@wright.EDU
Reply-To: dcourte@eve.wright.edu (Dale Courte)
Organization: Wright State University, University Computing Services
Lines: 93

Have any of you experienced the following when attempting to telnet to
your Multimax?:

   Trying...
   Connected to xxxxxx
   Escape character is '^]'.

   Umax 4.2 (xxxxxx)

   Login: Connection closed by foreign host.

The "connection closed" comes up immediately after the word login
appears. It is impossible to log in.

If you rlogin, the login is accomplished (provided the machine you are
rloging in from is in your .rhosts), the message of the day is printed,
the system prompt appears, then BANG, you get "connection closed".

Only a "call" from an annex server will get you logged in at this point.
Most of our users on campus don't use an annex.

Here's what I have found through countless encounters with this very
annoying problem:

   1) It is the next available psuedoterminal which seems to be the
      problem. For instance, if the problem exists and I do a 'w' and
      see:
          
            3:54pm  up 1 day, 18:50,  13 users,  load average: 1.25 1.93 2.67
          User     tty       login@  idle   JCPU   PCPU  what
          cse4a031 ttyp0    11:11am         2:03   1:41  ksh
          cse4a028 ttyp1     3:49pm            7      2  ksh
          cse1001  ttyp3     3:54pm            2         ksh
          cse6028  ttyp4     3:51pm           11      2  ksh

      the problem will persist until either the user on ttyp0 or ttyp1
      logs off. Then another user can log in. Then the problem
      returns. I assumed from this behavior that the problem was
      therefore with the psuedoterminal ttyp2 (or whatever - it is
      not always the same one).

   2) If I peruse the output of 'ps -aux' when the problem occurs, I can
      always find a process "hanging around" assigned to that
      psuedoterminal. Sometimes multiple processes, other times just
      the telnetd or rlogind belonging to root.

   3) If the processes assigned to the psuedoterminal are killed (which,
      of course, is not always advisable in an environment where
      faculty research jobs are often running in the background) the
      problem goes away.

   4) The people at Encore (at least the _old_ Encore) never seemed to
      believe my story. I reported it three times, then just decided to
      sit back and wait for the "imminent" arrival of Umax 4.3. That was
      at least 6 months ago. Meanwhile, I just spend a lot of time
      waiting for the phone to ring and for someone to say "There's a
      psuedoterminal hosed up again. Can you fix it?"

In any of you have seen this problem, please let me know if:

   1) You have found a solution to the problem?

   2) You would be willing to corroborate my story if I take it to the
      _new_ Encore?

   3) If you are a beta site for Umax 4.3, has the problem been fixed in
      4.3?

Speaking of the _new_ Encore, I would also like to know what experiences
any of you have had with the new organization. I am intersted because I
lost a sales rep, was never informed of the fact until I posted a minor
flame on the net, was then contacted by a very apologetic person who
said he was "temporarily" my rep. I then heard nothing more for quite a
long time. Next, the person who does our accounting here asked me for
our rep's name. I gave him this "temporary" rep's name. He called, only to
find that we had yet another rep and had once again not been informed.

Let me make it clear that I am _not_ trying to start a flame-fest here.
I merely want to know if my experiences are unique. I am not unhappy
with our Multimax. There are several problems I have contacted (_old_)
Encore about and have gotten prompt service. The Multimax hardware has
been _very_ reliable, and hardware service has always been prompt. As
mentioned above, I have had almost no contact with the new Encore and
that bothers me, as does the one nagging software problem described
above.

Let me know if you have any input which might help me.

Thank You.

-Dale Courte
 Wright State University
 CSNET: dcourte@eve.wright.edu    BITNET: dcourte@wsu