Using the XSS SCREENSAVER when you WALK AWAY
The Athena Rules of Use specify that you may not leave your
workstation unattended for more than 20 minutes.
If you are going to be away from your workstation for any length of
time, you should not just walk away. When you do this, you are
inviting an unscrupulous person to do anything they want to with your
account. Anything that they choose to do could easily be blamed on
you. Also, your machine might be accidentally rebooted because it may
not be possible to tell how long you have been gone.
If you want to safely leave your machine for some period of time, you
should SAVE ALL YOUR WORK. This will ensure that whatever happens, you
won't lose anything that you were doing before you left. You should
also lock your screen. This will keep anyone from doing anything but
log you out while you are gone. You can use the xss screensaver
program for this. Type:
xlock
This will immediately start the screensaver and lock the computer.
When you want to unlock the screen, hit a key or press a mouse button
and then type your password and press RETURN.
By default, your workstation will automatically start its screensaver
after 10 minutes of idle time, and lock after 1 additional minute. If
you would like to adjust these settings, you can run:
xscreensaver-demo &
If you prefer having a graphical interface to activate the
screensaver, instead of the xlock command described above, you can
alternatively run:
xss-button &
This should give you a small icon. To activate the screen saver, push
the middle mouse button with the mouse cursor on top of the icon and
drag the mouse to "Activate Screensaver" on the menu. Let go, and
your screen should lock.
Please do not leave your screen locked for an extended period of time;
workstations are in short supply much of the time, and if you leave
your screen locked for a long time, someone may log you out or reboot
your workstation. The Athena Rules of Use state that any workstation
which is locked for more than twenty minutes can be rebooted if
another user wants to use the workstation, and in fact, after twenty
minutes, xss will give users the option of logging you out.
Last updated: $Date: 2004/03/15 17:24:55 $
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