Actually, maxusers is simply a macro value in SAM's formula calculations for selected kernel parameters. It has no connection with the number of users that can login. SAM starts with a template for building the kernel and makes some basic assumptions about what a 'typical' user might need.
For instance, the number of processes needed by one user might be 3 (a telnet daemon, a shell, a copy of vi, etc) so the default value of nproc (maximum number of processes on the entire machine) might be set as:
nproc=(maxusers * 3) + 45
where 45 represents an approximate number of kernel and daemon processes that are always running, regardless of user count.
Then other kernel parameter formulae might depend on these such as nfile:
nfile=(nproc * 6) + 250
So nfile depends on nproc which depends on maxusers. BUT: these are only approximations since one user might login 5 times. Therefore, maxusers is more like maxsessions. But that still isn't right if you are using a client/server database where no one actually logs into the computer but connects to the database through a network port.
And if you use SAM to change a value to a fixed amount (ie, replace the formula with a single number) then maxusers has no effect on that parameter when the kernel is built.
After you become more familiar with kernel parameters, you will probably override most of the common parameters with fixed numbers to more accurately reflect your system's environment.
Bill Hassell, sysadmin
