Bug 2296 - w reports wrong idle times
Summary: w reports wrong idle times
Keywords:
Status: CLOSED NOTABUG
Alias: None
Product: Red Hat Linux
Classification: Retired
Component: procps
Version: 6.0
Hardware: i386
OS: Linux
medium
medium
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: David Lawrence
QA Contact:
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 1999-04-20 22:53 UTC by seti
Modified: 2008-05-01 15:37 UTC (History)
0 users

Fixed In Version:
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed: 1999-07-29 22:00:06 UTC
Embargoed:


Attachments (Terms of Use)

Description seti 1999-04-20 22:53:03 UTC
Idle times for remote users are reported wrongly and they
don't match up with finger. eg.

finger:
Login     Name      Tty  Idle  Login Time   Office
Office Phone
seti                  pt        Apr 21 08:34
(elan.maths.monash.edu.au)

w:
USER     TTY      FROM              LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU
PCPU  WHAT
seti      pts/0    elan.maths.monas  8:34am  4:40m 38.33s
0.01s  w

w shows 4:40minutes of idle time wheras finger shows zero
(the correct value). w gets hours and seconds screwed up
as well I think.

This has happened on all i386 platforms that I've tried.

Comment 1 rob 1999-04-23 23:17:59 UTC
$ w
  6:12pm  up 5 days, 23:47,  2 users,  load average: 0.20, 0.14, 0.10
USER     TTY      FROM              LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU  WHAT
rob      tty1                       5:38pm 29.00s  2:05   0.07s  -bash
root     tty2                       6:11pm 34.00s  0.14s  0.05s  -bash
$ finger
Login     Name               Tty  Idle  Login Time   Office     Office
Phone
rob       Robert W. Current   1         Apr 23 17:38
root      root               *2         Apr 23 18:11
$

Mine shows exactly what your reporting, ALTHOUGH, I don't believe w is
showing an incorrect idle time, it is just reporting times from
console.  If your in X, it's likely that w isn't picking up the
actions you do in an xterm.  Try to look at them from console.

eg:
[rob@water rob]$ w
  6:15pm  up 5 days, 23:50,  2 users,  load average: 0.01, 0.07, 0.08
USER     TTY      FROM              LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU  WHAT
rob      tty1                       5:38pm  0.00s  2:08   0.01s
script times
root     tty2                       6:11pm  3:24   0.14s  0.05s  -bash
[rob@water rob]$ finger
Login     Name               Tty  Idle  Login Time   Office     Office
Phone
rob       Robert W. Current   1         Apr 23 17:38
root      root               *2      3  Apr 23 18:11
[rob@water rob]$

Which appears correctly.  So, it looks like something to do with
what's going on in X (don't know about telnet, maybe that acts like X
also).  But, they are working correctly from console.

Don't know if it's any help, but at least it's more specific.

Comment 2 Michael K. Johnson 1999-07-29 22:00:59 UTC
Rob appears to be right.


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