capturing user idle time with the finger command

[JMD55]

Hello Everyone;
I've written a ksh script which essentially tracks users idle time. I was told that the finger command would return valid idle time for a particular user. I was told this by several wanna be admins. I have been using Exceed software to open a session remotely. Well I wrote all of the code (all based on the finger command) which is logically sound (so it seems). I have found that when I run the finger command on a console (locally) I don't receive any idle time. I do receive idle time for all users who are remotely connected to a machine , but not for the console user. I realize I may need to rework my code for idle time. Is there anyway I can get a users idle time ???
If there isn't, I was thinking of trapping keystrokes and mouseclicks - if the user is doing either it means he isn't idle, but I just don't know how to do this in Solaris. Can any of you knowledgable people help me out........Thanx ....

 

[KenCunningham]

I had a similar requirement a while ago.

finger -i returns the idle time for users.
Hope this helps.

 

[grega]

w username will also return the idle time. w on it's own will produce a list for all users logged in.

Greg.