Re: login with capital letters

Peter K (pko@paradigm.co.za)
Sun, 19 Nov 1995 16:39:42 +0200 (SAT)

> This is the first time I tried to login with a capital word.
> This makes the login useless. Is this a bug?
> Why do the words change to capital letters?
> However, if you let it be for 60 seconds, it will say time out then back
> to normal.

Actually, this is a feature of Unix going back to its inception. The idea
behind it was, at the time, to cater for terminals which did not have
lowercase capability. Hence if you login using caps the kernel accepts
that you do not have lowercase capability and automatically converts all
output to uppercase (since lowercase would not be interpretable by that
terminal). The timeout value of 60 secs causes the getty to be respawned
and it assumes its default characteristics, ie, lower- and -uppercase.

Peter Kooiman | Fax : ++27-12-663-4191/2
Paradigm Systems Technology |
Pretoria, South Africa | UUCP : pko@silmaril.UUCP
Voice : ++27-12-663-5340 | DNS : pko@paradigm.co.za