[toda]

Previous versions of vista have allowed a shutdown command to be issued in n seconds where n can be any number. Vista business (at least) now requires a maximum of 600 seconds ot 10 minutes.

In a hypothetical situation, say I wanted to download a file which was to take about an hour. I needed to leave my workstation but still shut it down before I left the office for the weekend. I would normally set the shutdown timer for 2 hours, or 3 just to be sure the file had finished downloading. Now with the 10 limit, this cannot be achieved.

My question is this: What is the motivation behind such a change in policy, can it be reversed, and is the same across all platforms?

John

[jaclaz]

I cannot say what the motivation is, but the shutdown command always had that limit also in 2K/XP:
http://www.ss64.com/nt/shutdown.html

Mainly because you don't use it normally with such big a delay, it is much more convenient to use either the old AT command:
http://www.ss64.com/nt/at.html
or the newish SCHTASKS:
http://www.ss64.com/nt/schtasks.html

And, in the case of a shutdown depending on a certain action having been completed, the "proper" way is to use a conditional check (for example in the case of a file download, check the local filesize every, say, ten minutes and IF filesize is correct, initialize the shutdown)

jaclaz