topic Re: Display Locking in Operating System - HP-UX

Display Locking

Vishal Phlad — Mon, 17 Jul 2000 08:27:55 GMT

Our users run applications of a unix box via telnet session.
Is there a way to lock the users telnet session if there has been no keyboard input for a certain amount of time ?
When the user tries to enter something it asks for his/her unix password in
order to continue working

Re: Display Locking

RikTytgat — Mon, 17 Jul 2000 08:54:51 GMT

I don't think this is possible.

There is an alternative though. It is possible to log the user off after a predefined period of inactivity. All shells I know off support this feature (sh-posix, sh, ksh, bash).

When the environment variable TMOUT is set and has a value greater than 0, the shell terminates after waiting the number of seconds for user input.

If your users are using CDE, it is possible to lock the screen after a predefined period of inactivity, after which a password is required.

Hope this helps,
Rik

Re: Display Locking

CHRIS_ANORUO — Mon, 17 Jul 2000 09:27:43 GMT

You can add session time at the end of the telnet line in /etc/inetd.conf file.
Eg telnet stream tcp nowait root /usr/sbin/telnetd telentd -t1200
(1200 is in seconds)

Cheers!

Re: Display Locking

RikTytgat — Mon, 17 Jul 2000 09:55:14 GMT

Chris,

Where did you get that information? I looked in the manpages on 10.20 and 11.00 but did not find anything.

I also tried it out, but the connection stays open, even after the time expired.

Thanks,
Rik

Re: Display Locking

Account Not Used — Tue, 18 Jul 2000 14:40:00 GMT

From a security perspective using the TMOUT variable in the /etc/profile is probably the safest way to achieve this task. Example:
TMOUT=6000;export TMOUT. The number 6000 is in seconds.

Re: Display Locking

Deshpande Prashant — Tue, 18 Jul 2000 15:08:23 GMT

You can add following lines in /etc/profile
TMOUT=600
readonly TMOUT
This way the TMOUT parameter is made readonly and user can not change it at command prompt.

Prashant.