Tracking User Sign In and Sign Out Activity

Understanding the PSACCESSLOG Table

The PSACCESSLOG table includes the following fields. You can view the data in the table from the Access Log Queries page.

Note: PSACCESSLOG is a non-authoritative general view of the users of a PeopleSoft system. It should not be used as a critical part of PeopleSoft's security infrastructure. Oracle offers dedicated user management tools that do a better job of detailed user tracking.

PSACCESSLOG Record Field	Query Result	Description
OPRID	User	The PeopleSoft user ID.
LOGIPADDRESS	Client IP	The remote client's address at the time of sign on. The address is either an IP address or a host name as resolved by the PIA server's DNS server.
LOGINDTTM	Log In	The date and time that the client logged in, given in the database server's local time.
LOGOUTDTTM	Log Out	The date and time that the client logged out, given in the database server's local time. When the client logs in this field is initialized to LOGINDTTM.
NA	Duration (Min)	The time that the user is logged in to PIA, in minutes.
PT_SIGNON_TYPE	Signon Type	The valid values are: 1 (one) - This indicates a user signing on to PIA. 0 (zero) - This is another, non-PIA signon.
PT_SIGNOUT_REASON	Signout Reason	The reason the client signed out, if known. The valid values are: - (hyphen, Not Set ) The signon has not yet occurred. When the client signs on this field is initialized to this value. A - user abandoned The user abandoned their PIA browser windows and the web server eventually closed the user session. E - browser expired The browser window timed out due to inactivity and sent the web server notice of the expiration event. L - user logout The user actively signed out of PIA. R - user relogin While the user was signed on, a new login from the same browser session arrived for the same or another user. O - other The signout type was not one of the other defined reasons.
PT_TRACING_ID	TRID	The Tracing ID assigned to the user's session.

Understanding Abandoned Sessions

Abandoned sessions are identified in PSACCESSLOG when the PT_SIGNOUT_REASON record field is A. An abandoned session can occur when:

A user closes the browser’s last PIA page without signing out.
A user closes the entire browser, which has signed-in PIA pages.
A user puts a new URL in the current PIA page and navigates away to another web site.

Recording of abandoned sessions requires the web server to retain its list of active sessions. If the web server crashes then all session information is lost. Users who are logged on when the web server crashes will appear as signed into the system and not as signed out due to an abandoned session.

Using Access Log Queries

PeopleSoft provides several queries to track user sign-in and sign-out activity based on the data in the PSACCESSLOG table.

Access the Access Log Queries page (select PeopleTools > Security > Review Security Information and click the Access Log Queries link on the Review Security Information page).

Select one of the following queries:

Access Activity by User
View a single user's sign-in and sign-out activity (public query PT_SEC_ACCESSLOG_USER). Choose the User ID and click View Results. This log includes the following items:
- Client IP
- Log In
- Log Out
- Signon Type
- Signout Reason
- TRID
Access Activity by Day
View one or more days of all user sign-in and sign-out activity (public query PT_SEC_ACCESSLOG_DAY). Choose from and through dates, and click View Results. This log includes the following items:
- User
- Client IP
- Log In
- Log Out
- Signon Type
- Signout Reason
- TRID
Active User List
View the users who are currently signed in to the application in the browser (public query PT_SEC_CURUSER_LIST). This log includes the following items:
- User
- Client IP
- Log In
- Duration in minutes
- Signon Type
- TRID

These logs are generated using data from the PSACCESSLOG table. If you are not interested in monitoring access activity, you can delete the PSACCESSLOG table. Deleting this table has no negative effect.

Note: If you delete the PSACCESSLOG table and then decide that you would like to track user sign-in and sign-out activity, you must recreate the table. Use Application Designer to open the PSACCESSLOG record definition and create the table.