ulimit (was: getty/login for callback)

[Pat R. Calhoun]

In article <1034 at quintus.UUCP>, ok at quintus.UUCP (Richard A. O'Keefe) writes:
> There is nothing to stop me creating 500 1/2Mb files!

I cannot argue with the fact that multiple files can be created which would
defeat the purpose of having a ulimit. But this will more than likely happen 
only if creating huge files was intentional. However, I must admit that not
all user's are UNIX x-perts'... Not only once have I seen some junior 
programmer attempt to write a 'C' program which creates a output file. The
only problem is he forgets to increase a counter. (I guess I should note that
I had ulimit set up to ~4000000).

Assuming it's A Friday afternoon, and he leaves the process to execute and
hope to come in Monday morning to find his program works :-). Well, you're
planning another 'all week-end hack session' to find that you can't even log
in since the system ca't update utmp, or something of the like. I can personally
say that jumping into my car to drive at the office at midnight IS A PAIN IN
THE ASS!!!!!!

I realize there are alot of assumptions in my statements (and NO FLAME IS 
INTENDED!), but a senario similar to the above has happened to me. I agree
with all that ulimit is a barrier for most users, but if the user did
want to take up GIGABYTES of disk space, ulimit will not stop him. To me,
ulimit is a protection against users taking up GIGABTES of disk space
unintentionally (or out of stupidity)!!

> If the default ulimit had been infinity (with ordinary users only being able
> to decrease it), any sysadmin who wanted the present state of affairs could
> have done it with one line in /etc/profile, and sites that didn't want to
> know about it wouldn't have had file transfers die mysteriously.

After the above incident had occured to me, I learned quickly and wrote a
new shell (almost same as BOURNE) except that it takes a user id and 
compares it in a user database which contains the users' allowable
ulimit size. Since then everybody seems happy.

-- 
"The statements above do not reflect my thoughts, but those of my employer
who forces me to think this way (OR ELSE!!!!!)"

	_^_ |||			Pat "King of the Trenches" Calhoun
       <o o> |			Technical Support Group, Lanpar Technologies
      /\/\/\/\/\	UUCP:   ...!attcan!nebulus!tslanpar!mslanpar
		  DISCLAIMER:   "Read the DAMN manual, I don't need this SHIT!!"