Multiseat Support in HAL

[Fabian Steiner]

Since Xorg 7.0 it is possible to set up a real multiseat box ([1], [2])
(several independent workplaces on one machine) without having to apply
additional patches (Ruby [3], etc.).

We are running such setups (OS: Ubuntu Dapper 6.06) at school and so far
almost everything works quite well. We are really content with that work
since it saves us a lot of money and time. Unfortunately, there is still
one feature missing, though. So far it is not possible to assign proper
permissions to hotpluggable devices such as memory sticks and cameras.
That means that whenever user A plugs in his usb stick, B gets notified
as well and he is able to mount it when A doesn't act faster. This may
be a severe security risk if private data (e.g., passwords, ssh-keys) is
stored on it.

There are on-going widely spread discussions, even on this list [4], how
one could possibly solve this issue but nothing has been done so far.
Therefore we did a lot of investigation on our own in recent time but
whenever we thought we had hit the point various other problems and
difficulties were arising. If you are interested, let us know and we
will describe everthing we have tried.

That's why we have decided to address to you. We really think that
multiseat setups will become more and more interesting and reasonable.
So we would like to ask whether such a feature might be added to HAL and
 how we could achieve this. Of course, we will try to help as much as
possible (testing, etc.)!

Thank you,
Fabian Steiner

[1] https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MultiseatX
[2]
http://blog.chris.tylers.info/index.php?/archives/14-Multiseat-X-Under-X11R6.97.0.html
[3] http://www.ltn.lv/~aivils/?proj_id=ruby
[4] http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.freedesktop.hal/2845/focus=2845