HP OpenVMS Systems Documentation

Content starts here 7.10 Creating a System-Specific Login Welcome Message (Optional)
HP OpenVMS Version 8.4 Upgrade and Installation Manual > Chapter 7 After Installing or Upgrading the OpenVMS Operating System

7.10 Creating a System-Specific Login Welcome Message (Optional)

You can use SYS$WELCOME to display a system-specific welcome message at login. The message could inform users of scheduled down time, recent updates to the system, whom to contact about system problems, and so forth. A template file is provided by the operating system. To create your own SYS$WELCOME file, do the following:

  1. Copy the template file using the following command:

    $ COPY SYS$MANAGER:WELCOME.TXT SYS$SPECIFIC:[SYSMGR]WELCOME.TXT

    For a clusterwide welcome message, you can copy the file to SYS$COMMON:[SYSMGR].

  2. Replace the text in SYS$SPECIFIC:[SYSMGR]WELCOME.TXT with text specific to your system.

  3. Edit SYS$MANAGER:SYSTARTUP_VMS.COM to remove the exclamation point (!) from the line that defines SYS$WELCOME.

If you do not want to use a node-specific welcome file, you can optionally define the logical in SYS$MANAGER:SYSTARTUP_VMS.COM to display a message, such as in the following example:

$ DEFINE SYS$WELCOME “Welcome to node HOMER”

For more information about creating login welcome messages, see the HP OpenVMS System Manager's Manual, Volume 1: Essentials.