[27693] in Hotline Meeting
User Complaining about being logged out [42000]
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (mgood@MIT.EDU)
Mon Apr 3 15:42:08 1995
From: mgood@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 3 Apr 95 15:42:05 -0400
To: hotline@MIT.EDU
Cc: accounts@MIT.EDU
Hi!
The user below spent about 30 minutes arguing with us Friday about the
Rules of Use. Interesting tidbits he mentioned:
In his time at MIT, he had made many enemies, many of whom would
cheerfully log him out.
When I said he could use departmental resources for batch jobs, he
indicated he had tried and expressed a general disdain for the management
of the economics cluster, called them names, and generally dissed them.
Of course, later in our conversation he compaired following the Athena
Rules of Use with following orders in Nazi Germany.
He generally indicated that since he was a PHD student, his work was more
important than undergraduates.
He indicated that his goal was to make sure that the person that logged
him out "received the highest censure possible for his actions".
My favorite was his contension that the machines were only being used late
at night when no one was using them, but at the same time they ran a job
for two days... hmmmm....
We explained that whoever did it, student or staff, did the right thing,
but he didn't absorb that.
Here's my mail to him, with his mail below:
[42052] daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (mgood@MIT.EDU) Athena_Accounts_Requests 04/03/9
5 15:22 (35 lines)
Subject: Your Question About Being Logged Out [42000]
From: mgood@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 3 Apr 95 15:22:25 -0400
To: pmschuls@MIT.EDU
Cc: accounts@MIT.EDU
Reply-To: accounts@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: [42000]
Hi!
I'm forwarding your mail to the appropriate people, but the reply you're
going to get will be pretty much the same that you got in 11-115.
In brief:
If you use Athena, you need to adhere to the Athena Rules of Use.
That includes the limit on screensaving workstations. If you don't like
the rule, don't use the system.
In addition to the 30 minutes worth of reasons we gave you Friday,
there are Network Security concerns with keeping a machine running
continuously over several days.
Also, as you pointed out, there's no way to know who logged you
out, and as you indicated, many people other than Athena staff could have
logged you out, and they were fully justified in doing so.
If an Athena employee logged you out, they were doing their job.
I have forwarded your message on, though, and you'll probably get
a responce in the next couple of weeks.
If you have any further questions, please let me know!
Matt Goodman
Athena User Accounts
--[42052]-- (pref = [42000], flagged)
[42000] daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (pmschuls@MIT.EDU) Athena_Accounts_Requests 03/3
1/95 15:17 (60 lines)
Subject: No subject found in mail header
From: pmschuls@MIT.EDU
To: accounts@MIT.EDU
Date: Fri, 31 Mar 1995 15:17:44 EST
Hi, my name is Paul Schulstad. I am a graduate student
in economics. Last night in the student center cluster, myself
and a fellow ph.d student in economics had our screensaved
computers logged out. This happened at approximately 6:00am.
My friend in particular had a sign on his computer that said
(paraphrased) ` important program running, please do not logout
or else I lose 48 hours work'.
My computer was also logged out, although with less drastic consequences
( I lost only 3 hours work.)
I understand that the athena rules of use are such that unoccupied
screensaved machines may be logged out. However, I also understand that
thesis related computer work has the highest priority. My friend and I are
very upset that we were logged out. In particular, at 6:00 am when there
is noon e using the machines.
I have the following questions:
(1) who in the mit hierarchy is officially goes through the
the w20 cluster at 6:00am in the morning to logout machines?
My spies tell me that the person responsible takes great pleasure
in his `work'. He particularly enjoys destroying the programs
of people such as myself. As you know it is very close to thesis
deadline time and I cannot let this continue.
(2) Who is the immediate superior of the person responsible for
logging me and my friend out?
I would like to talk to them and try to get the rules to be
applied in a more pragmatic fashion. I understand that
if there is a computer science term paper or
assignment due or if it is the last week of term that the computers
are in high demand and that screensavers should be logged out.
My quarrel is that someone is logging us out, WHEN THERE
IS NO DEMAND FOR THE MACHINES, if and only if the person gets
a special pleasure from destroying the work of students should my
machine be logged out. I have the computer programmed to logout
at 9:00am, well before the cluster gets crowded.
Thanks in advance for your reply. I am not the kind of person who
typically complains about such matters. But enough is enough.
I am very busy right now, but I am in the frame of mind to try
to have the person responsible reprimanded.
I understand that the rules are the rules. But they
should be applied in a more flexible fashion so that
at times of low demand for the computers, people are not
logged out just for the sake of a rule.
Paul Schulstad
