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Cannot override logout after 20 mins of inactivity

Here's an odd one.
I have a couple of iMacs that have the option to "logout after 20 mins of activity" ticked in security preferences.
I don't want this to happen, so as an administrator I can uncheck the option and click the padlock icon to prevent changes.
However, even with the option unchecked, they'll still log out after 20 mins, and when I revisit the security preferences page again, the option will be ticked again.

Any clues, anyone?

Mac OS X (10.5.8), iMac 4Gb, Black MacBook 2Gb, AEBS, plethora of iPods & iPhones...

Posted on Feb 7, 2011 1:04 PM

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Question marked as Best reply

Posted on Feb 7, 2011 1:06 PM

click the padlock icon to prevent changes.


That's stopping the change from being recorded. If you still want to click it, switch to another pane first.

(56686)
3 replies

Feb 8, 2011 1:34 AM in response to Niel

Thanks for the reply, but I've tried clicking the padlock and also leaving it alone.
The result is always the same. If I uncheck the the logout option, or change the number of minutes, *it always returns to the same settings when I navigate away from the security preferences*, and then return to them.
There is no "save settings" option, and other checkboxes, like the "require password" option IS retained if I check it.

It's just the automatic logout setting.

This is really frustrating. I didn't setup these particular Macs.
Is there another setting elsewhere that could be overriding this?
Or a preference file to delete?

I really don't understand what's going on.
Any help much appreciated.

Cannot override logout after 20 mins of inactivity

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