Today I am using BigBrother/BBgen 3.6. One of the custom features I have hacked into our system is the ability to have multiple admin users that can put servers into maintenance mode. In our BB configuration we made extensive use of the the HostGroup function. Basically creating an aliasname for a list of devices. This came in handy when writing alert rules, I could do one alert rule for a series of devices.
Now for maintenance mode, I hacked the maint.pl script found on deadcat. That script was then put into a directory that apache password protected. When you logged in, the maint.pl script compared your login name to any HostGroup that was defined, and if the login name matched a HostGroup the maintenace device listing only listed the devices that were defined by the the HostGroup.
Now I did see the archived mailing list article, Re: [hobbit] New Features #2 (the 'publish-cookie' option) (http://www.hswn.dk/hobbiton/2005/05/msg00369.html). That solution really only limits users from viewing different pages. The maint option under the device info report is located under the /hobbit-cgi/ and I do not see a way to limit users from disabling devices they shouldn't. If a user has an admin password, they seem to have admin rights to all of hobbit.
Under Hobbit I do not see anyway to define HostGroups, so my old method will not work. Using HostGroupings seemed ideal in that it linked alerts being sent to users and the user's ability to disable devices/tests.
~Steve