maverick: utmp/last is logging every xterm

[Adam Funk]

On 2011-01-27, C de-Avillez wrote:

>
> On 01/27/2011 10:28 AM, Adam Funk wrote:
>
>> What changed from lucid to maverick --- the xterm default or the utmp
>> logging configuration?  (Just curious.)
>
> Probably the applications' defaults. Please keep in mind that utmp
> -- very simplified -- is just a file and a simple API. Applications
> _must_ write to it, the system does NOT take that action. There are
> no logging options to utmp.
>
> As time went by, since the initial utmp, less and less applications
> wrote entries -- and some of them made it optional, some of them
> just dropped support.
>
> *Usually*, but not always, an entry is written if you set the
> application default to "simulate login" (or whatever it is called,
> varies a bit); this is mostly valid on terminal emulators or shells.
>
> So. Chances are the applications changed the default for utmp.
> Certainly *nothing* in utmp would do it.

OK, that makes sense.  Looking through the changelog [1], I get the
impression that utmp logging was supposed to be included in lucid but
couldn't be because libutempter was in universe; but in maverick that
library is in main so the feature could be put in xterm.  Of course, I
could have the wrong end of the stick.

I guess it's personal taste, but I'm not sure why anyone would want
every xterm to be recorded as a log-in.


[1]
/usr/share/doc/xterm/changelog.Debian.gz