Yes, Tops-20 did use the account field if you were doing billing (I.E., had account validation turned on).

A user could be associated with one or more accounts and, if you didn't have a default set for login, you had to tell it which one you wanted your usage billed to. This was unusual as the more common alternative was to sign in under the default and switch accounts, depending on what account you wanted an activity billed to.

This was incredibly flexible for our consultants. They would sign on with the their staff account being defaulted from their login directory. After taking care of any clerical stuff (like having some coffee), they then would switch accounts for whatever customer they might be doing some work for. The class scheduler could be hooked off the account, which was also pretty gee whizzy.

This functionality still exists in both the Extended Mode FTP server (I do a VACCT% on the ACCT verb) and Tops-20 FAL, meaning whatever I get for the ACCOUNT field I validate with VACCT%. If you aren't doing billing (I.E., account validation is off), then the JSYS does nothing more than syntax check.

I don't do billing, but I do use some of the data that is collected to determine how well (or poorly) some of my modifications are doing.

My recollection is that Tops-10 had similar billing functionality, but I don't remember whether it was used by FAL.

On 11/29/23 6:10 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
Actually, I'm not sure any system use the account field. I know that it seems like systems like TOPS-20 might have used it, but I seem to remember when checking that it also ignores it. It's not even clear what the semantics of that fields is supposed to imply.