file under tcb

[Nivesh Patnaik]

Say I have an account vlaad with associated file /tcb/files/auth/v/vlaad.

What process or event would lead to the creation of /tcb/files/auth/v/vlaad-t ???

The presence of this new file leads to
problems accessing that account.
Any pointers would be most helpful.
Thanks.

[Rick Garland]

Having this file in the /tcb location would indicate a trusted system. Having the specific file of /tcb/files/auth/v/viaad would indicate a user account called 'viaad' has been created.

Look in the /etc/passwd (only look - no changes!) and see if this account exists there.

What kinds of problems are you experiencing?

[Nivesh Patnaik]

I noticed this problem on a system so I tried to duplicate it on another system.

The vlaad account is okay, absolutely no problem there. Then I manually did:
cd /tcb/file/auth/v
cp -p vlaad vlaad-t

Now when I try logging in as vlaad, not
only is the login process slow, but I am
unsuccessful in logging in.

Remove the vlaad-t file, and the account
works just fine.

Originally I did not create the "-t" file
on the problem system, so I am trying to
get info on what (is it the kernel doing
it when inode table is full) creates such a
file and what is the meaning of that file.

[Simon Hargrave · Accepted solution]

The user-t files are created by various utilities that maintain the TCB database (sam) as a lock to make sure multiple utilities don't try and edit the database as the same time.

They can be left around if the system crashes, SAM crashes etc mid-edit. They essentially lock the accounts out.

They are perfectly safe to remove, and are just left over from an incomplete maintenance command.

[Rick Garland]

What was viaad doing?

Was the account running some process that filled the file inode table?

This account was doing something when the event happened. Doesn't mean that viaad was doing something wrong. Just that viaad was doing something.

[Nivesh Patnaik]

That explains it. The -t file was generated
at a time when the system was being taxed
and ran out of inode table space. I'm not
sure it was SAM that locked the account; it
may have been a cron job that switches to
that account or something similar involving
a login.
Thanks so much for the information.

[Nivesh Patnaik]

No more follow ups necessary. Mr. Hargrave
gave very useful information.