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Re: /var/log/wtmp problem
Jurgen Defurne wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Can someone explain for what /var/log/wtmp is used ?
>
> It seems that this file grows very quickly in our Cygwin environment, and
> I
> want to find out which programs write to this file. /var/log/wtmp gets
> an update almost every two seconds here.
>
> We do not use very much programs, I think this covers the complete
> list :
> - screen (no reference to wtmp found in info)
> - bash (standard shell)
> - Perl (background programs/ exec ?)
> - ssh
> - rxvt
> - watch
You can find some info about it in man last:
NAME
last, lastb - show listing of last logged in users
SYNOPSIS
last [-R] [-num] [ -n num ] [-adiox] [ -f file ] [name...] [tty...]
lastb [-R] [-num] [ -n num ] [ -f file ] [-adiox] [name...] [tty...]
DESCRIPTION
Last searches back through the file /var/log/wtmp (or the file desig-
nated by the -f flag) and displays a list of all users logged in (and
out) since that file was created. Names of users and tty's can be
given, in which case last will show only those entries matching the
arguments. Names of ttys can be abbreviated, thus last 0 is the same
as last tty0.
...
If your wtmp is growing that much you have a problem I haven't seen, take a look
at the output of "last | head" .
HTH
--
René Berber
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