Auto-logoff facility in Unix

[ado at elsie.UUCP]

brl-vgr!gwyn--
>	Our version of the Bourne shell will timeout the user if he (sic)
>	doesn't respond to a PS1 prompt within a specified amount of time. . .
>	The intention is to terminate the shell on an "abandoned" terminal, like>	when a fellow (sic) goes home for the day and forgot to log out	first.

elsie!ado--
>	Would requiring users to type in their passwords (rather than logging
>	them out) be preferable in a set-up like this?

brl-vgr!gwyn--
>	No, asking for password again rather than logging out is not suitable
>	for our environment (OS ports are a scarce commodity and we have to
>	freeup an idle line so the queued-up users can get through the port
>	contention switch).  I also don't think the shell has any business
>	asking for your password.

Thanks to gwyn for the added information about the purpose of the TIMEOUT stuff.
A question:  how is it that we decide that logging off users after a time IS
the shell's business while asking for your password is not?
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	decvax!harpo!seismo!rlgvax!cvl!elsie!ado	(301) 496-5688