Users at command prompt - argh !!

[HP System Handle Owner]

Hi all,

I've written a menu system that I want users of a group 'ops' to be presented with when they login. However, with the command below in /etc/profile, when they logout, it takes them out to a command prompt. How can I get it to automatically log them out when they decide to exit the opsmenu MAIN module.

Cheers

id | grep "gid=.*(ops)" 1>/dev/null 2>&1 && su - root -c "/usr/local/bin/ops/opsmenu MAIN "

Cheers again

[RAC_1]

at the end of the script say
exit "some_code"

you can use some_code to some further testing if you want.

[Pete Randall]

You might also want to put this in the login shell field of their /etc/passwd file entry rather than using /etc/profile.


Pete

[James R. Ferguson]

Hi:

If you are going to take this approach, at the very least, disable user terminal interrupts in your "opsmenu" script so that a user cannot easily become root.

trap '' 1 2 3 #...HUP, INT, QUIT

Be aware, if you are not, that including any command like 'more', or 'elm' that offers the ability to "shell-out" will enable a user to become root. Caveat emptor!

Regards!

...JRF...

[Geoff Wild]

add
exit 0

to bottom of the user's .profile

Rgds...Geoff

[Bill Hassell]

And an even better way is to replace the shell these limited users have with your menu script. Like all scripts should have, make sure the interpreter line is first:

#!/usr/bin/sh

Then you can either edit the passwd file and replace /usr/bin/sh with your script name (cumbersome and error-prone), or use the obscure command chsh as in:

chsh billh /usr/local/bin/ops/opsmenu

Since you can't put a parameter for a shell program in the passwd file, you'll need to wrapper the opsmenu with a specific option:

(a menu script called opsmenuMAIN)

#!/usr/bin/sh
set -u
PATH=/usr/bin
/usr/local/bin/ops/opsmenu MAIN
exit 0

I would not use su -c for the menu program at all. Instead, install sudo and then use it (only) in front of commands that require root privileges. sudo can limit the options allowed for a given command if needed. And sudo can log everything that the users type in.

[Procnus]

We have a similar situation where I work. As well as a trap at the top of the .profile we also use a exec on the last line to run the command. The result being once the exec'd application exits there is no shell so the session shuts down.

Cheers
Steven

[Mark Ellzey]

Hi,

When you execute your menu script, just put an 'exec' in front of it, as in:

exec /usr/local/bin/ops/opsmenu

This will replace the current shell with a new one, and will log out on exit.

Regards,
Mark

P.S. Are you sure they need to su to root? Sounds kind of dangerous to me...

Just my 2cts.

Mark

[Juan M Leon]

I tend to use Mark Ellzey is the best way to logout someone from a script.
exec /path/to/the/script.sh
When the script ends it will logout from the sh session.

good luck