FINGER



              FINGER  is  a  utility  to  display  information  about  a
         selected user or group of users.  It can be invoked  for  users
         on  the local node or on a remote node over DECnet, and is com-
         patible with the VMS implimentation of FINGER.  Full  function-
         ality  requires an RSX-11M+ system with resource accounting and
         DECnet.  

              FINGER is installed as follows:  

                   >INS FINGER
                   >INS FINGER/TASK=FIN$$$
                   >NCP SET OBJECT 117 NAME FIN$$$ COPIES 5
                   >DFL "your system id"=FINGER$SYSTEMID/GBL

         The logical name FINGER$SYSTEMID contains your system identifi-
         cation, to be printed at the top of the display.  If this logi-
         cal name is not defined, FINGER displays "PDP-11/RSX".  

              To use FINGER, type 

                   >FIN[switches] name

         Switches are ignored.  If the name is null, a list of logged-on
         users is displayed.  If the name is a dot, the user of the ini-
         tiating  terminal  is  fingered (this means you, normally).  If
         the name is not null, a list of logged-on users whose names are
         a generic match for the name given in the command is displayed,
         plus the contents of file FINGER.PLN from the home directory of
         any  user whose name exactly matches the name given in the com-
         mand.  The user name can include the wild card  characters  '%'
         (which  matches  any  one  character) or '*' (which matches any
         number of characters, including 0).  

              If  the name is preceded by a DECnet node name of the form
         "node::", or followed by a  node  name  of  the  form  "@node",
         FINGER  sends  the entire command (except for the node name) to
         that node for execution.  If both  leading  and  trailing  node
         names  are  specified,  the leading one takes precedence.  Like
         the VMS FINGERs I am familiar with, this FINGER supports  "poor
         man's  routing"  -  the specification of a chain of node names.
         If Finger receives a user name of "." over the net, the user of
         the  console  terminal is fingered;  "No such user" is returned
         if CO:  is not redirected to a logged-on terminal, or  account-
         ing is not active at that terminal.  

              FINGER  has  no way to determine what terminal devices are
         actually in your system.  When  determining  what  devices  are
         logged  in,  it  simply scans the devices that are listed in an
         internal table.  As distributed, it scans TT0:  through TT200:,
         HT0:   through HT40:, and RT0:  through RT40:.  No harm is done
         if your configuration contains fewer devices,  other  than  the
         loss  of  some  CPU cycles.  To modify the device table, change
         DEVUTS, DEVNMS, and/or DEVTYP in FINGERCOM as appropriate,  re-
         compile, and retaskbuild.