1SESSREG(1) General Commands Manual SESSREG(1)
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6 sessreg - manage utmp/wtmp entries for non-init clients
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9 sessreg [-w wtmp-file] [-u utmp-file] [-l line-name] [-h host-name] [-s
10 slot-number] [-x Xservers-file] [-t ttys-file] [-a] [-d] user-name
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13 Sessreg is a simple program for managing utmp/wtmp entries for xdm ses‐
14 sions.
15 System V has a better interface to /etc/utmp than BSD; it dynamically
17 allocates entries in the file, instead of writing them at fixed posi‐
18 tions indexed by position in /etc/ttys.
19 To manage BSD-style utmp files, sessreg has two strategies. In con‐
21 junction with xdm, the -x option counts the number of lines in
22 /etc/ttys and then adds to that the number of the line in the Xservers
23 file which specifies the display. The display name must be specified
24 as the "line-name" using the -l option. This sum is used as the "slot-
25 number" in /etc/utmp that this entry will be written at. In the more
26 general case, the -s option specifies the slot-number directly. If for
27 some strange reason your system uses a file other that /etc/ttys to
28 manage init, the -t option can direct sessreg to look elsewhere for a
29 count of terminal sessions.
30 Conversely, System V managers will not ever need to use these options
32 (-x, -s and -t). To make the program easier to document and explain,
33 sessreg accepts the BSD-specific flags in the System V environment and
34 ignores them.
35 BSD and Linux also have a host-name field in the utmp file which
37 doesn't exist in System V. This option is also ignored by the System V
38 version of sessreg.
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41 In Xstartup, place a call like:
42 sessreg -a -l $DISPLAY -x /usr/X11R6/lib/xdm/Xservers $USER
44 and in Xreset:
46 sessreg -d -l $DISPLAY -x /usr/X11R6/lib/xdm/Xservers $USER
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50 -w wtmp-file
51 This specifies an alternate wtmp file, instead of /usr/adm/wtmp
52 for BSD or /etc/wtmp for sysV. The special name "none" disables
53 writing records to /usr/adm/wtmp.
54 -u utmp-file
56 This specifies an alternate utmp file, instead of "/etc/utmp".
57 The special name "none" disables writing records to /etc/utmp.
58 -l line-name
60 This describes the "line" name of the entry. For terminal ses‐
61 sions, this is the final pathname segment of the terminal device
62 filename (e.g. ttyd0). For X sessions, it should probably be
63 the local display name given to the users session (e.g. :0). If
64 none is specified, the terminal name will be determined with
65 ttyname(3) and stripped of leading components.
66 -h host-name
68 This is set for BSD hosts to indicate that the session was ini‐
69 tiated from a remote host. In typical xdm usage, this options
70 is not used.
71 -s slot-number
73 Each potential session has a unique slot number in BSD systems,
74 most are identified by the position of the line-name in the
75 /etc/ttys file. This option overrides the default position
76 determined with ttyslot(3). This option is inappropriate for
77 use with xdm, the -x option is more useful.
78 -x Xservers-file
80 As X sessions are one-per-display, and each display is entered
81 in this file, this options sets the slot-number to be the number
82 of lines in the ttys-file plus the index into this file that the
83 line-name is found.
84 -t ttys-file
86 This specifies an alternate file which the -x option will use to
87 count the number of terminal sessions on a host.
88 -a This session should be added to utmp/wtmp.
90 -d This session should be deleted from utmp/wtmp. One of -a/-d
92 must be specified.
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95 xdm(1)
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98 Keith Packard, MIT X Consortium
99X Version 11 sessreg 1.0.0 SESSREG(1)