Regular users (untrusted with programmer privileges) definitely should not be 
allowed to
"drop to the GTM prompt". It may also be that they have no need to access the 
linux prompt
either.

In that case, there may not be any point in even assigning them individual 
linux user
accounts. You could instead set up a single "vista" user account and either 1) 
set up a
service to listen on a special port, such as through inetd (similar to setup of 
VistA
RPC), to run the VistA login routine as that user or 2) tie the shell for that 
user to the
vista login as Michael and others suggested.

The difference would be in the setup and maintenance of one or many linux (or 
other OS)
user accounts in addition to the VistA user records and in the layers of 
password
protection that users have to go through each time they log in.

One argument in favor of setting up individual linux accounts for 
non-programmer users is
that linux password encryption is much stronger. The released VistA software 
that I know
of has very weak password encryption or none. If you rely on VistA login only 
in a
production environment, then you might want to replace the supplied encryption 
routines
with something stronger.

If you set up individual linux accounts for your users. You could avoid going 
through two
levels of login by mapping the linux user account to the VistA user number and 
bypassing
the VistA login.

There are other arguments in favor of individual linux accounts for VistA users 
for more
advanced systems administration.

>After the user logs in to linux, have a shell script automatically execute that
>takes them into VistA.  Regular users shouldn't have access to the linux/unix
>prompt nor the GT.M prompt.
>
>
>Michael Zacharias
>
>
>
>--- Matthew King <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>> I have a basic question about security in VistA. If I access Fileman as
>> a regular user (MD)and Inquire the New Person file, I can read the
>> number of the administrator. Then if I drop to the GTM prompt and SET
>> DUZ=AdminNumber, I can get a programmer's shell without needing a
>> access/verify pair.
>>
>> How does one force password prompting or otherwise stop this from
>> happening?
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> matt

---------------------------------------
Jim Self
Systems Architect, Lead Developer
VMTH Computer Services, UC Davis
(http://www.vmth.ucdavis.edu/us/jaself)


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