The finger command shows you how long terminals have been idle.
The finger command can also show you who’s logged in, and the output is a little more friendly. For example, if I run finger without any arguments, I see all users listed:
% finger
-User --Full name- -WhatIdle TTY -Console Location-
andyo Andy Oram bash-1 2:05 r0 ncd13 (X display 0)
bobbi Bobbi Kraham tcsh 1 s7 ncd20 (X display 0)
tcsh 40 s8 ncd20 (X display 0)
bonnie Bonnie Hyland xemacs u3 ncd32 (X display 0)finger doesn’t just tell you who’s logged in, it also tells you their full name, what program is currently active in that terminal window, and how long they’ve been idle in that window (if at all).
Like who, finger only pays attention to terminal shells. So when it says someone has been idle for five hours in each of her terminals, that really doesn’t tell you very much. For example, since I’ve been doing all my work today in FrameMaker and with my graphical mail program, anyone checking my idle time will probably think that I haven’t done anything for hours. finger doesn’t know that I’ve been typing madly in my FrameMaker window all afternoon.
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