Privacy

[Robert Heller]

In message <20040312085044.346efab7.listmail at allenz.net>, Allen Ziegenfus write
s:
>On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 21:34:34 -0800
>Bill Wohler <wohler at newt.com> wrote:
>
>> Jim Woodruff <james.woodruff at comcast.net> writes:
>> 
>> > My computer is accessed by the entire family and my kids friends.
>> > Is there a way to password gnucash or its data files? I've searched
>> > the help files and man pages without success.
>> 
>> Use Unix security:
>> 
>>   $ chmod 700 gnucashdir
>> 
>> Log out when you're not using the machine. Give each member of your
>> family and their friends their own account.
>> 
>
>How do people  actually do this in practice? I long for fast user
>switching ala XP or OS X where you can leave your apps running while
>someone else logs on. The only way I've heard of to do it with Linux is
>to run more than one X server process.

The 'su' command is one option.

Generally, though it is considered a 'bad thing' to just stay logged in
on a *shared* machine, as this is a security risk.  Oh, 'expert' UNIX
users don't always use resource heavy desktops (like Gnome or KDE).  And
for 'lightweight' tasks, like checking mail, this can be done with a
console window instead of firing up X11.

Another option is getting each 'user' their own 'Xterm' box -- that is a
cheap low-end machine (traditionally diskless, but disks are really
cheap these days).  Each user logs in to their personal box and then
sshes/slogins to the main machine and runs their applications
'remotely', using the X server on the cheap box, with the application
running the main machine.

OTOH, it is also possible to run non-interactive jobs in the background
using 'nohup ... &' (usually with nice).

>
>Sorry if this is OT. 
>
>AZ
>
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                                     \/
Robert Heller                        ||InterNet:   heller at cs.umass.edu
http://vis-www.cs.umass.edu/~heller  ||            heller at deepsoft.com
http://www.deepsoft.com              /\FidoNet:    1:321/153