interacting with shell - another newbie question

[James Stroud]

James wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I work in this annoying company where I have to autheticate myself to
> the company firewall every 30-50 minutes in order to access the
> internet.  (I think it's a checkpoint fw).
> 
> I have to run "telnet what.ever.ip.address 259" then it prompts me
> with userid, then password, then I have to select "1".  Then the
> program closes itself and the internet is enabled.
> 
> I would like to automate this process with Python and run it every 30
> miniutes so I don't have to keep typing in these userid/password
> everytime.  How can this be done?  Is there a module I can use to
> interact with the shell? (I'm running linux)
> 
> Thank you.
> 
> James
> 

You should really randomize the timing somehow--and skip some intervals.

You do not want some turd figuring out that you have scripted the 
process and ratting on you to the dorks who came up with this scheme.

Maybe keep track of your manual activites for a while in terms of timing 
and then attempt to approximate what you find using the random module.

James