O8i on Linux: identified externally

Hello out there,

I cannot get the OS authentification to work on my Oracle 8i 8.1.5.0.1 installation on Linux.
I have a Linux user called 'la'. So I logged into Oracle as system and did

create user la identified externally default tablespace ... grant connect to la;

Now from another xterm I try the following:

sqlplus la

(I'm logged in as la)
But it asks for a password. What do I do wrong? I did not find a solution in the docs. Do I have to set some environment variables? I even tried to create a Linux user 'LA' but LInux gives some strange results with that. Then I tried an Oracle user in lower case:

create user "la" ...

But it did not work either.

Who can help?

Thanks in advance,
Lothar

--

Lothar Armbrüster       | lothar.armbruester_at_rheingau.netsurf.de
Hauptstr. 26            | lothar.armbruester_at_t-online.de
D-65346 Eltville        |