HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: kiron@vedge.UUCP (Kiron D. Bondale)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Setting up Macintoshes with NFS
Date: 13 Apr 92 15:36:33 GMT
Organization: Visual Edge Software, St. Laurent, Quebec

Hi all...

	We have a couple of Mac SEs that we would like to integrate into
our Unix network.  Although I have found mentions of TCP/IP server software
for Macs, I have'nt found any software that would allow me to mount
remote NFS volumes on my Mac and access them as usual folders.
	Does anyone know of NFS software that would allow me to perform simple
NFS operations such as mounts and exports on the Macs?  Any information would
be appreciated...

thanks


Kiron


-----------------------------------------------------------------------
+ Kiron D. Bondale      + "The more you put things together, the more + 
+ Systems Administrator + they fall apart"... The Sys. Admin.'s creed +
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Visual Edge Software Ltd. + 3870 Cote Vertu, St. Laurent, Quebec,
========================= + Quebec, Canada H4R 1V4  Tel: (514)-332-6430
kiron%vedge.uucp@iros1.iro.umontreal.ca        
kiron%vedge.uucp@larry.mcrcim.mcgill.edu
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: dbearly@unix1.tcd.ie (domo baby)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Substituting words in vi
Date: 10 Apr 92 18:35:55 GMT
Organization: Trinity College, Dublin

In <1992Apr9.012945.17804@u.washington.edu> payman@hardy.u.washington.edu (Payman Arabshahi) writes:


>Does anybody know how to substitute something like
>  \index{hello}

>for the word
>   hello

>everywhere it appears in a document, using the vi
>editor or EMACS?
How about a global replace  

:g/hello/s//\\index\{hello\}/g

		i think!

			Dom.
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
From: jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens)
Subject: Re: TCP/IP TIME_WAIT state ( not a test )
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Distribution: comp.unix.questions
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 19:48:07 GMT

In article <1992Apr9.161957.8043@dg-rtp.dg.com> scott@tdc.rtp.dg.com (John Scott) writes:
   In article <etxtsil.702662978@kk152>, etxtsil@kk152.ericsson.se (Torbj|rn Sellen TT/TSD) writes:
   |> How do you get rid of the TIME_WAIT state when you have
   |> shutdowned and closed a TCP/IP connection by closing the server
   |> before the client ?

   The answer is you don't.

A better answer is, "You use setsockopt() to set the SO_REUSEADDR
option on the server socket to true before using bind()."

-- 
Jonathan Kamens						jik@MIT.Edu
MIT Information Systems/Athena		    Moderator, news.answers
    (Send correspondence related to the news.answers newsgroup
	{and ONLY correspondence related to the newsgroup}
		 to news-answers-request@MIT.Edu.)
Xref: sparky comp.unix.questions:5937 comp.compression:1442
From: jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.compression
Subject: Re: .zip files
Date: 7 Apr 92 16:19:27 GMT
Followup-To: comp.compression
Distribution: usa
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology

In article <2977@eastman.UUCP> birecree@cygnus.Kodak.COM (Jack Birecree) writes:

     Does anyone know where I can get the compression/uncompression program for .zip files (via ftp?)

1) Please keep the lines in your postings shorter than 80 characters
long in the future.

2) I suggest you read these postings:

Subject: comp.compression Frequently Asked Questions (part 1/2)
Subject: comp.compression Frequently Asked Questions (part 2/2)
Newsgroups: comp.compression,news.answers

Subject: How to find sources (READ THIS BEFORE POSTING)
Newsgroups: comp.sources.wanted,alt.sources.wanted,news.answers

Available in the indicated USENET newsgroup(s), or via anonymous ftp from
pit-manager.mit.edu (18.172.1.27) in the files:

/pub/usenet/news.answers/compression-faq/part1
/pub/usenet/news.answers/compression-faq/part2
/pub/usenet/news.answers/finding-sources

Also available from mail-server@pit-manager.mit.edu by sending a mail message
containing any or all of:

send usenet/news.answers/compression-faq/part1
send usenet/news.answers/compression-faq/part2
send usenet/news.answers/finding-sources

Send a message containing "help" to get general information about the
mail server.

-- 
Jonathan Kamens						jik@MIT.Edu
MIT Information Systems/Athena		    Moderator, news.answers
    (Send correspondence related to the news.answers newsgroup
	{and ONLY correspondence related to the newsgroup}
		 to news-answers-request@MIT.Edu.)
From: bengtl@maths.lth.se (Bengt Larsson)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Much Ado about Nothing: white space and sh and csh
Keywords: csh sh test expr
Date: 13 Apr 92 08:21:25 GMT
Organization: Lund Institute of Technology, Sweden

In article <9amhb94k@csv.warwick.ac.uk> cudcv@warwick.ac.uk (Rob McMahon) writes:
>One that really is annoying is
>
>$ set a b c
>$ for i
>> do echo $i; done
>a
>b
>c
>$ for i; do echo $i; done
>syntax error: `;' unexpected
>$ uname -a
>SunOS clover 4.1.2_ER 8 sun4m
>$ 
>
>Does anyone know how widespread this bug is ?  I notice bash is okay.

   $ for i do echo $i; done

If there is no list after "for" (following an "in") then you may not
have a ";" there. You may generally have a semicolon to terminate a
list, but after "i" the shell is expecting a keyword, not a semicolon. 

Arguably allowing the semicolon is more intuitive.

Bengt L.
-- 
Bengt Larsson - bengtl@maths.lth.se
From: zellich@stl-07sima.army.mil ( Rich Zellich)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject:  Re: How to trim off spaces from the file name
Date: 10 Apr 92 15:00:00 GMT

You could always use sed, but I got tired of that and wrote a small utility
called "nowsp" (NoWhiteSpace) that trims:

   leading white space (spaces and tabs)
   trailing white space (spaces and tabs)
   all consecutive blank lines after the first one

It reads stdin and writes stdout, and does not take filenames as arguments
on the command line.  By default, it does all 3 trimming actions (perhaps
trimming multiple blank lines should *NOT* be done by default, but it seemed
the consistent thing to do).  You can do any 1, 2, or 3 of the trimming
operations by specifying -l and/or -t and/or -b (as I said, -tlb is the
default).

If you want a copy of the C code for this little utility, send me a message
directly.  I tried to reply directly to the original submitter of this
question, but our non-domain-server mail system didn't know about his host;
if I get a message directly, I can probably work out some kind of return
path from the Received headers.

Cheers,
Rich
-------
Here's the nowsp.doc file (sorry, I haven't written a "real" man page for it):

   Reads lines from standard input and writes to standard output minus any
   leading or trailing spaces or tabs, or extra blank lines, depending on it's
   command-line arguments:

      l  - strip Leading white-space
      t  - strip Trailing white space
      b  - strip extra Blank lines (allows 1 blank line between lines, but
           strips 2nd, 3rd, nth consecutive blank lines)

   With no args, does all three operations.

   NOTE: If only the -b option is specified, a line containing all spaces
   and/or tabs will NOT be considered to be "blank" and will not be stripped.
   A single leading or trailing blank line will not be stripped.
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.unix.sysv386
From: navarra@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (John Navarra)
Subject: Re: windowing on normal character terminals
Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 01:06:30 GMT

In article <1992Apr12.141523.2016@nic.unh.edu> pss1@kepler.unh.edu (Paul S Secinaro) writes:
>In article <1992Apr12.031835.6028@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> navarra@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (John Navarra) writes:
>
>Has anyone come out with a version that doesn't require sockets?  I
>think this was what the poster was complaining about.  I'd also be
>interested in a version that will work without sockets.
>
	Sorry about not commenting on that. As far as I know, screen still
needs sockets and it is unlikely that will change since most of the code
revolves around them.

-tms
-- 
From the Lab of the MaD ScIenTiST:
					
navarra@casbah.acns.nwu.edu		
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.unix.sysv386,biz.sco.opendesktop
From: dan@dribble.c-mols.siu.edu (Dan Ellison)
Subject: OS/2 LAN-Server to SCO UNIX connectivity?
Organization: Southern Illinois University - Carbondale, IL (SIU-C)
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 1992 15:17:16 GMT

Is anyone aware of a product (commercial or otherwise) that will allow
an SCO UNIX host to access a file server running OS/2 LAN-Server?  For
some reason (unknown to me) our campus has implemented this platform
for several key file servers on our CAN.  This is all fine if you
want to buy into Big Blue's networking schemes, not so fine if you
are a UNIX site.

I know of a product to allow Mac's to access the server as if it were
an AppleShare server but don't know of anything that addresses the
unix world.  Any pointers or suggestions greatly appreciated and
thanks in advance.

--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Dan Ellison, Network Admin	  -    	Molecular Science Program SIU-C | 
| Southern Illinois University 	  - 	Carbondale, IL 62901            |   
| FAX:      (618) 453-3459        -   	PHONE:    (618) 453-7310 	|     
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
From: u780228@math.nthu.edu.tw (Stace Yeh)
Subject: Re: stranger login without passwd entry
Organization: National Tsing Hua University (HsinChu)
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 06:07:08 GMT

    Thanks to all people who reply to me.

    I am sorry that I forgot to say that the machine I used
doesn't run YP.  Besides, there is some guest account in my
machine without password, so I don't think it's a security
machine.

    Though it has a  rw_rw_rw_ /etc/utmp, it seems it is not
because of this.

	    				       Best Regards,
					           Stace Yeh
					  ------------------
				    u780228@math.nthu.edu.tw
From: drake@drake.almaden.ibm.com (Sam Drake)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: What is the POSIX call for microsecond sleep?
Date: 11 Apr 92 06:23:31 GMT
Organization: IBM Almaden Research Center

In article <12416@auspex-gw.auspex.com> guy@Auspex.COM (Guy Harris) writes:

>Do any of the systems listed above give real one-microsecond or
>one-nanosecond resolution?

Not listed above, but AIX V3 really does give microsecond resolution.  
The hardware clock can be set to go off after any interval, not just
a constant "tick", and that feature is used to provide accurate timing.
There IS a regular 1/100th sec "tick", too.


Sam Drake / IBM Almaden Research Center 
Internet:  drake@almaden.ibm.com    BITNET:  DRAKE at ALMADEN
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
From: dcb@kopachuk.uucp (David Breneman)
Subject: Re: UNIX equiv. of CLS for ATT605?
Organization: Tacoma Screw Products, Inc.
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 1992 22:11:36 GMT

In article <5137@dsacg3.dsac.dla.mil> nto0302@dsacg3.dsac.dla.mil (Bob Fisher) writes:
>From article <bill.702651896@chaos.cs.umn.edu>, by bill@chaos.cs.umn.edu:
>> PS9ZRHMC@MIAMIU.BITNET (Peter Sweeney) writes:
>> 
>>>Is there a UNIX equivalent for the DOS CLS command?
>>>I'm using an AT&T 605 terminal.  When I log off, it
>>>sends a clearscreen signal.  What is it doing?
>>> 
>
>"tput" is available on many systems and outputs command strings for
>terminals defined by $TERM.  If your terminal is correctly defined, you
                              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>can do such things as "tput clear", "tput bold", etc.
>

A zillion other people are probably going to post this as well, but...

You can even do it if your terminal *isn't* correctly defined, by doing

tput -Tvt100 clear        ( -T Declares type of terminal )

I have yet to encounter a terminal that won't clear its screen in
response to this command (execpt decwriters :-)  ).

-- 
David Breneman     Sys Admin, Tacoma Screw Products, Inc. |  ____  ____  ____
dcb@tacoma.uucp              | SCREWIE the TSP CLOWN sez- |   /   /___  /___/ 
 ..!uunet!stephsf!tacoma!dcb |"Stainless steel bolts are  |  /   ____/ / 
CompuServe: 75760,1232       | ferrous but non-magnetic!" |
From: steimann@exquando.quantum.de (Ulrich Steimann)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Much Ado about Nothing: white space and sh and csh
Keywords: csh sh test expr
Date: 9 Apr 92 17:06:33 GMT
Organization: Quantum Software GmbH, Dortmund, Germany

In article <ku51nmINNimj@early-bird.think.com> barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin) writes:
)In article <1992Apr7.175911.20627@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu> mflll@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu (Dr. Laurence Leff) writes:
)>sh seems to not want spaces around  it's assignment operator.
[...]
)This rule is necessary for cases like the "for" statement, so that tokens
)such as "do" don't inadvertently terminate the list of words the iteration
)variable will take, e.g.
)
)for x in say do be a do bee dont be a dont bee
)do
)  echo $x
)done

Have you ever tried:

	$ for for in in do; do echo echo done; done


Sorry, couldn't resist.

-- 
Ulrich Steimann, Quantum GmbH, D-4600 Dortmund    email: steimann@quantum.de
FAX: 0231-75441-115   Diese Signatur ist gleichberechtigt im Sinne der Bits:
Sie enthaelt 1180 '0' und 1180 '1'.   Es folgen die Quotenbits:
------________________________________________________________________------
Xref: sparky comp.unix.questions:6115 comp.unix.wizards:2170 comp.unix.sysv386:8536
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.unix.wizards,comp.unix.sysv386
Subject: Re: SVR4 network problem
From: karl@ttank.ttank.com (Karl Bunch)
Date: Sun, 12 Apr 1992 07:05:45 GMT
Reply-To: karl@ttank.com
Distribution: usa
Organization: Think Tank Software, Norwalk, CA

In <1992Apr10.114452.4190@news.rn.com> larry@news.rn.com (Larry Snyder) writes:

>gram@uctcs.cs.uct.ac.za (Graham Wheeler) writes:

>>Basically, any operation which involves opening some form of network connection
>>is extremely slow. This includes telnet (takes about two minutes for login
>>prompt), netstat (can take up to ten minutes), and any forking of X clients.

>hmm -- which version of Dell?  We run Dell SVR4 2.1 here -- and use telnet,
>rlogin and ftp all the time (and I mean all the time -- at any given time..

Same here.  Perhaps you've started your named up and it isn't configured
properly?  Or /etc/resolv.conf points to a name server that is down?

Try using telnet with the Address not hostname:

telnet 123.456.789.012

instead of:

telnet joe.doe.sloppy.com

If when you use the Address it's fairly quick.  Also try: netstat -n
(Don't use nameserver)

Good Luck,
Karl
-- 
% ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
% Karl Bunch                        ||| UUCP: ..!uunet!cerritos.edu!ttank!karl
% Think Tank Software               ||| INTERNET: karl@ttank.com
% 42.5% of all quoted statistics are made up, of those 23.185% are right. :-)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
From: cazier@mbunix.mitre.org (Cazier)
Subject: VMS 5.5/POSIX
Organization: Houston, TX
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 1992 15:25:54 GMT

We are looking into moving our DEC System 5500 users to a 6610 running
VMS 5.5 which I understand includes a POSIX kernel.  I would like to find out
what functionality the current UNIX users are going to lose (if any) running
under VMS 5.5 with the UNIX-like (or POSIX) shell.

The current production application is written in C, but I'm unsure of the
compatibility between an Ultrix system and the VMS environment. It seems
to me that the Ultrix ".exe" executable does not run in the VMS environment.

However, in the "POSIX" environment I believe the users are able to run
a UNIX-like shell w/o losing any of their curent capability. Please correct
me if I'm wrong.

What types of porting problems would the current application suffer with the 
move to VMS 5.5?

Any kind of heads up on such a move would be kindly received. Thanks.
From: Dean.Roth@mixcom.mixcom.com (Dean.Roth)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Omen's zmodem's Ymodem-g & Procomm problem
Date: 8 Apr 92 14:26:35 GMT
Article-I.D.: mixcom.1992Apr08.142635.5322
Distribution: usa
Organization: Milwaukee Internet Xchange BBS, Milwaukee, WI U.S.A.


Omen Technology's zmodem software supports Ymodem-g,
which is Ymodem batch without error correction (assumes
you have an error free link with error correcting modems).

Ymodem batch works fine with Procomm+.  But Ymodem-g does
not. Omen's UNIX software seems to work O.K.  But at the
end of a transfer Procomm reports the transfer aborted.

Is anyone else seeing this? What's the fix?  Thank you.

Dean
From: jfh@rpp386.lonestar.org (John F Haugh II)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: How to copy to another machine's /dev
Date: 13 Apr 92 15:05:12 GMT
Organization: River Parishes Programming, Austin TX

In article <1992Apr9.122702.2665@prl.dec.com>, boyd@prl.dec.com (Boyd Roberts) writes:
> In article <12347@auspex-gw.auspex.com>, guy@Auspex.COM (Guy Harris) writes:
> > [...] Boyd might find it more interesting, as - given his employer
> > - he's more likely to have a little-endian machine on his desk that I
> > am....)
> 
> No, I'd be interested if it worked with real heterogeneity.

Tell DEC to contact LCC and buy TCF.  It works well with S/370's and
PS/2 in the same distributed cluster.  You can read and write, from a
S/370 to the console of a PS/2, setting IOCTL modes as you go.  You
can use the tape of a S/370 as the backup device on your PS/2, and
so on.  [ For the uninformed, the PS/2 is little endian and the S/370
is big endian. ]
-- 
John F. Haugh II        | Every 56 days.   | UUCP: ...!cs.utexas.edu!rpp386!jfh
Ma Bell: (512) 251-2151 | Give Blood, often.    | Domain: jfh@rpp386.cactus.org
"A countryman between two lawyers is like a fish between two cats."
		-- Benjamin Franklin
From: har@ux.acs.umn.edu (--SeebS--)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.amiga
Subject: Re: This is really stunning, guys.
Date: 8 Apr 92 02:34:04 GMT
Article-I.D.: ux.1992Apr8.023404.6616
Distribution: na
Organization: University of Minnesota

In article <1992Apr07.131603.22182@ncrcae.ColumbiaSC.NCR.COM> Steve.McClure@ColumbiaSC.NCR.COM writes:
>xdm is not run by ttymon so that argument doesn't really apply, but the theory
>is the same.

I thought it was init, not ttymon, that was turning things off - for instance,
when I had typed the wrong path for xdm, it got turned off after about 2
minutes.

>Steve McClure		internet:	Steve.McClure@ColumbiaSC.NCR.COM
>NCR E&M Columbia 	uucp:		...!uunet!ncrlink!ncrcae!steve.mcclure
>3325 Platt Springs Rd	Ma Bell:	(803) 796-9250
>West Columbia, SC 29169
>Disclaimer:	The above are my opinions and are not NCR official policy.

-s
-- 
Peter Seebach, using my fiancee's acount. (Please use "SEEBS" in the subject
line, so we know who it's for.)  Polygamy: "There can be more than one."
"I love using MS-DOS - waiting for the machine gives me so much free time!"
har@ux.acs.umn.edu (Love Incarnate)
From: rhealey@kas.helios.mn.org (Rob Healey)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.amiga
Subject: Re: Unix, Amiga and the BBoard... also new sparc stuff
Date: 2 Apr 92 15:01:27 GMT
Article-I.D.: kas.458
Organization: Rob's home system, Hopkins, MN

In article <CONSP03.92Mar30094114@bingsunn.cc.binghamton.edu> consp03@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Kriston J. Rehberg) writes:
=The A3000UX will never be able to compete with these clones.  It will
=never achieve the mass-market volume production necessary to bring the
=price down to what the machine is really worth.  It should not be any
=more expensive than a comparable Sparc.
=
	It was never designed to compete with RISC boxes despite the fact
	everybody insists on saying so. The problem with UX's are the
	hardware price which hopefully C= will deal with soon.

=Commodore has a loser here.
=
	Nope, they do fine selling it as one kick butt ADOS box which it
	is. The UX machines are also faster then the Intel equivelent
	machines, 25MHz 386's running SVR4. If all your looking for is
	some hot shit CPU performance and maintainance costs that are
	astronomical then RISC is for you. The Amiga's and Intel clones
	are for those of us who can't afford a couple a $k per year
	in maintainance fees or $2k/boardswaps...

	The RISC machines still aren't particularly graceful at video
	production on a small budget or have decent software that costs
	~$100.00. The Amiga 3000 under ADOS has many useful apps, under
	UNIX it has access to all the net software and can be a good
	member of a corporate/academic net with TCP/IP and X. The UX's
	aren't losers, they are poor price performers which C= COULD
	fix fairly easily if it decides to. C= has to lower the base
	costs of normal Amiga 3000's to compete anyways so the UX's should
	come down at the same time.

	The RISC boxes make poor personal machines, they have a genetic
	craving to be on a good sized network and have cushy maintainance
	contracts to fix 'em when they break. The Amiga 3000's in general
	make good personal machines because they can run 2 very good OS's.

	Just because the UX's fail your personal test of "usefulness" doesn't
	make them complete losers.

		-Rob
From: har@ux.acs.umn.edu (--SeebS--)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.amiga
Subject: further TIGA oddness.
Date: 6 Apr 92 06:41:49 GMT
Article-I.D.: ux.1992Apr6.064149.8325
Organization: University of Minnesota

ok... a few more weirdies. I'm hoping that, if I keep posting
things, someone will be able to tell me what's wrong.

1] When X screensaves, the cursor remains visible.
2] if I log out of the login window that is supposed to bring
  the server down, it crashes heavily about a minute later.
  ("Fault 6" on the console.)
3] I got the error "No GSP memory for cursor data." recently.

etc. etc. Any ideas? Is my TIGA card hosed? Do I need a new
tigagm.coff? Do I need a new X server? Do I need to burn mac
fern entrails on the keyboard at dawn?

-s
-- 
Peter Seebach, using my fiancee's acount. (Please use "SEEBS" in the subject
line, so we know who it's for.)  Polygamy: "There can be more than one."
"I love using MS-DOS - waiting for the machine gives me so much free time!"
har@ux.acs.umn.edu (Love Incarnate)
From: ee23042f@vttcf.cc.vt.edu (Zaphod Beeblebrox)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.amiga
Subject: Amiga 3000UX, much cheaper!
Date: 13 Apr 92 00:29:57 GMT


For sale:

  Amiga 3000UX:

  25 MHz 68030 & 68882

  9 MB memory (1 MB chip, 8 MB fast)

  200 MB SCSI hard drive (12ms)

  C= 1950-B Multiscan monitor

  C= Ethernet card (10mb, thick/thin)

  Amiga UNIX

  Amiga DOS

  C= A-10 speakers

  Productivity software for both OS's

  $3900

 
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% ;-) %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Brian Wentz     
Virginia Tech                          wentz@csugrad.cs.vt.edu          
703-232-2300
From: skrenta@cbnewsg.att.com (Rich Skrenta)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.amiga
Subject: Re: login timeout (was Re: This is really stunning, guys.)
Date: 14 Apr 92 18:05:26 GMT
Organization: AT&T
Originator: skrenta@cbnewsg.cb.att.com

scott@starlite.convergent.com (Scott Lurndal) writes:
> At 50 attempts per second, that takes about 33 minutes.   Ergo, the 
> login timeout, no matter how much we dislike it, is valuable from a 
> security standpoint.

I dispute this.  Remember that 50 per second is unrealistically
high; you'll only achieve that if you're snarfed the encrypted
password from /etc/shadow somehow and are running your own crypt
on it.

An attack against a login prompt is unlikely to be faster than
one or two attempts per second, and likely will be much slower.
Introducing a four second sleep here won't help.  An order of
magnitude difference isn't going to make your system secure.
If I can try passwords on your modem for a whole day without being
noticed, I can try them on four of your modems for two days.

If you are concerned about dictionary attacks, then turn on the
password hack that requires numerics, punctuation and funny caps
in the password, or better yet, randomnly generate them for your
users.  Four second delays are annoying, they don't stop crackers,
and they give people a false sense of security.

--
Rich Skrenta