topic Re: login timeout in Operating System - HP-UX

login timeout

jeff go — Tue, 04 Jun 2002 16:29:39 GMT

Hi guys

on another note....

Is there a timeout session that i can disable
when logged in so it does not boot me out due to inactivity ?

thans for your help...

Re: login timeout

Bill Hassell — Tue, 04 Jun 2002 16:53:46 GMT

The only standard feature in HP-UX that can do that is the shell timeout, normally not set. For POSIX shell users, type:

echo $TMOUT

If set, it will be the number of seconds of idle shell prompt time before an auto-logout occurs. For csh, the variable is autologout and is in minutes.

In both cases, the shell only counts the time at the shell prompt. If you run a copy of vi, the timer stops and restarts once you exit vi.

So, simply set TMOUT or autologout to 0 to avoid getting a timeout. However, I would only do this when your computer is not connected to any network. This is more of a security issue than performance controls.

Re: login timeout

PIYUSH D. PATEL — Tue, 04 Jun 2002 18:26:03 GMT

Hi,

You can search for the following entry in the /etc/profile or .profile file of the users.

Remove the TMOUT paramters from /etc/profile for all users.

TMOUT=seconds

TMOUT affects how the shell itself operates. So if someone is sitting at a
shell prompt too long, they get logged out.

But if they, for instance, run the vi editor and then walk away, TMOUT does no
good. The vi editor ignores TMOUT. While any program could obtain TMOUT and
respect it, none except the shell do (as far as I know).

Even if they did, the editor would probably just exit and thus the shell would
then start a second TMOUT period.

Thats it.

Regards,
piyush

Re: login timeout

Martin Johnson — Tue, 04 Jun 2002 19:48:57 GMT

You may want to check with your System Administrator (SA) to make sure he/she is not running a "killer" script. A "killer" script is one that monitors Process IDs and their CPU utilization. It will kill a process that has been idle for so many minutes. Some SAs run "killer" script to get around those users who sit in vi to avoid being killed.

Marty