Our automated termination of idle VNC/X sessions has been in place for many years. As of Fall 2016, we also introduced automatic termination of Linux workstation logins deemed to be idle.

NOTE: This only applies to our Linux users with graphical sessions. Regular remote logins to a shell using ssh are not affected.

Any workstation login session idle for over 3 hours will be terminated. The affected workstation session receives a popup warning window that is displayed on the desktop 10 minutes before the session is terminated. Idle implies no X server user input.

NOTE: This only affects the following workstations.

• CS Linux lab workstations

• FAB 55-17 Linux workstations

All remotely established VNC/X sessions that are idle for over 48 hours are terminated. Idle implies no X server user input.

NOTE: This only affects the following systems.

• ECE: auto, mo, velocesolo

• CS: ada, babbage, CS Linux lab systems

• MCECS: ruby, rita, FAB 55-17 Linux workstations

We find that many users forget to log off when leaving the labs, resulting in locked workstations. We also find that many VNC/X users will not re-attach to their old sessions, starting new ones instead. These control measures have been taken to ensure availability of resources to all the users of these systems.

NOTE: These controls are not in effect on research-focused compute servers or desktops.

If you are planning on running long running un-attended sessions using either of these graphical desktop based environments, learn about the guidelines for running them at:

https://cat.pdx.edu/users/guidelines/long-running-jobs

and then contact the CAT for consultation and approval if your use requires it. (Approval is based on resource consumption and non-peak-time use.)