TonyBlog

For those of us who are lazy or forgetful, and yet still like their computers locked when they walk away - there is a solution. My computer has a simple, cheap, bluetooth dongle in it - that, teamed with a simple script and a bluetooth-enabled cell phone, makes my comptuer lock itself when I walk away.

Gentoo-wiki has the script and a simple guide relating to it
http://gentoo-wiki.com/TIP_Bluetooth_Proximity_Monitor

The script makes the bluetooth dongle on my computer constantly check if my phone is within range of it, if it finds that it is not in range (I went to the bathroom, etc) - it then tells xscreensaver to lock my system - and when I walk back in, the system quickly unlocks, as the computer see my phone, and unlocks my computer. Simple and quite effective.

I made a simple video of me using a metal case to block the signal and demonstrate what happens when the phone goes out of range.

http://workstation.tonybox.net/stp60505.ogg
Video is OGG/Theora with vorbis audio

Note that the audio is very low volume, using the mic built into my camera..