Single Passwords


On January 25?, 1985, Athena will change the way the system handles
passwords.

This change will affect everyone who has an Athena account on more than one
Athena machine.  In the past, each Athena account on each machine was 
independent of any other account you might have on a different Athena
machine, even though they had the same username.  If you changed your
password on one system, that change would not be transferred to any
other system unless you went and manually changed it.
People tended to not change their passwords because of the chore it
represented, making their accounts more vulnerable to theft.

Beginning January 25 (?need accurate date?), if you change the password
for a username on any Athena machine, your password for that username will
be changed on all Athena machines.  There will be a lag between the
time the initial change is made and the rest come into line.  Updates
from the central database will generally occur about 5:15 p.m. and
1:15 a.m. daily, although this may not happen with absolute regularity.

Which password will we use to start with?  We will use the password for
your account on the Athena machine that occurs first in alphabetical
order.  /*Unless somebody says different, this is how we'll go, W20
and all*/  

If you have two different usernames (me and metoo, for example), and you
change the password for one, the other will not be affected.