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I have this file named .joe_state in my home directory. The contents are as follows:

# JOE state file v1.0
search
    backwards 0
    ignore 0
    replace 0
    block_restrict 0
done
macros
done
files
done
find
done
replace
done
run
done
build
done
grep
done
cmd
done
math
done
yank
done
file_pos
done

I don't believe I've ever done anything to create this file. I've never run Joe's Own Editor. Is this something leftover from a routine run by PA staff?

Some of the stats of the file in question are: 4.0K -rw------- 1 a2j registered_users 205 Oct 13 04:10 .joe_state

None of us use JOE on purpose. Is it possible that JOE was fired up by another tool? A git commit could start JOE for your commit message. Perhaps there's a tool that you use that uses JOE internally?

I can imagine it's quite easy to type joe by mistake and it wouldn't surprise me if it created that file on any invocation.

My brother's name is Joe....Perhaps I should just blame him...☺

I was just hoping someone may know for sure. I don't suppose it will be figured out unless I delete it and then watch closely for it to return to see what the cause is.

The good news is I use a long pseudo-random password and 4K ssh key, so I'm not a good candidate for being hacked by user credentials.

Thank-you for the responses.

On a whim I just installed and ran joe on my desktop machine, and upon exit it does write ~/.joe_state even if you haven't actually done anything with it.

So my guess is that someone ran joe as a typo at some point (whether a2j or PA admin) and hit CTRL+C without thinking and quickly forgot about it.

It sounds unlikely that someone else would have obtained access to your account, but if you're concerned then you could always take a peek at your .bash_history file to see if there's anything you don't recognise. You could also get your .bashrc to email you every time someone logs in, but that could get very annoying very quickly... (^_^)

It's a good point, the email combined with a mailbox rule that sends those emails to their own folder may not be bad....perhaps even better would be sending the email as a text message to a cell phone, so one could directly correlate the log in event with the message. Thus any message you get and weren't expecting would immediately alert you to the issue.

Just remember to put some hysteresis into it so it only sends you something a second time after a 30 minute cool-off or something, and every login within this period resets the timer. This prevents you getting spammed if you open lots of consoles in quick succession.

Also, make sure your .bashrc doesn't get invoked by scheduled tasks or you'll get spammed every hour!

Thx for advice.