2 .\" David L. Nugent. All rights reserved.
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5 .\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
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25 .\" $Id: pw.8,v 1.5 1996/12/19 15:22:41 davidn Exp $
32 .Nd create, remove, modify & display system users and groups
142 .Op Fl m Ar newmembers
160 is a command-line based editor for the system
164 files, allowing the superuser and easy to use and standardized way of adding,
165 modifying and removing users and groups.
168 only operates on the local user and group files; NIS users and groups must be
169 maintained on the NIS server.
175 and the secure and insecure
176 password database files, and must be run as root.
178 The first one or two keywords provided on
180 command line provide the context for the remainder of the arguments.
185 may be combined or provided separately with
192 and may be specified in either order (ie. showuser, usershow, show user and user show
193 are all considered to be the same thing).
194 This flexibility is useful for interactive scripts which call
196 for the actual user and group database manipulation.
197 Following these keywords, you may optionally specify the user or group name or numeric
198 id as an alternative to using the
204 The following flags are common to all or most modes of operation:
206 .Bl -tag -width "-G grouplist"
212 to obtain policy information on how new user accounts and groups are to be created,
215 option specifies a different configuration file.
216 Most of the contents in the configuration file may be overridden via command line
217 options, but it may be more useful to set up standard information for addition of
218 new accounts in the configuration file.
220 Use of this option causes
222 to suppress error messages, which may be useful in interactive environments where it
223 is preferable to interpret status codes returned by
225 rather than messing up a carefully formatted display.
227 This option is available in add and modify operations, and causes
229 to skip updating the user/group databases and instead print the result
230 of the operation without actually performing it.
233 option to switch between standard passwd and readable formats.
235 Using this option with any of the update modes causes
239 after changing to the directory
241 This is intended to allow automatic updating of the NIS database files.
242 If separate passwd and group files are being used by NIS, then use the
244 option to specify the location of the NIS passwd database so that pw
245 will automatically update it concurrently with the system password
250 The following options apply to the
256 .Bl -tag -width "-G grouplist"
258 Specifies the user/account name.
260 Specifies the user/account numeric id.
262 Usually, you need only to provide one or the other of these options, as the account
263 name will imply the uid, and vice versa.
264 Also, you may provide either the account or userid immediately after the
270 keyword on the command line without the need to use
274 There are times, however, were you need to provide both.
275 For example, when changing the uid of an existing user with
277 or overriding the default uid when creating a new account.
280 to automatically allocate the uid to a new user on
289 Options available with both
294 .Bl -tag -width "-G grouplist"
296 This field sets the contents of the passwd GECOS field, which normally contains up
297 to four comma-separated fields containing the user's full name, office or location,
298 work and home phone numbers.
299 These sub-fields are used by convention only, however, and are optional.
300 If this field is to contain spaces, you need to quote the comment itself with double
303 Avoid using commas in this field as these are used as sub-field separators, and the
306 character also cannot be used as this is the field separator in the passwd file.
308 This option sets the account's home directory.
309 Normally, you will only use this if the home directory is to be different from the
310 default (which is determined from pw.conf, which specifies the base home directory
311 - normally /home - with the account name as a subdirectory).
313 Sets the account's expiration date.
314 Format of the date is either a UNIX time in decimal, or a date in
316 format, where dd is the day, mmm is the month, either in numeric or alphabetic format
317 ('Jan', 'Feb' etc) and year is either a two or four digit year.
318 This option also accepts a relative date in the form
322 is a decimal, octal (leading 0) or hexadecimal (leading 0x) digit followed by the
323 number of Minutes, Hours, Days, Weeks, Months or Years from the current date at
324 which the expiry date is to be set.
326 Sets the account's password expiration date.
327 This field is identical to the account expiration date option, except that it
328 applies to forced password changes.
329 The same formats are accepted as with the account expiration option.
331 Sets the account's primary group to the given group.
333 may be either the group name or its corresponding group id number.
334 .It Fl G Ar grouplist
335 Sets the additional groups to which an account belongs.
337 is a comma-separated list or group names or group ids.
338 When adding a user, the user's name is added to the group lists in
340 and when editing a user, the user's name is also added to the group lists, and
341 removed from any groups not specified in
343 Note: a user should not be added to their primary group in
345 Also, group membership changes do not take effect immediately for current logins,
346 only logins subsequent to the change.
348 This option sets the login class for the user being created.
351 for more information on user classes.
353 This option instructs
355 to attempt to create the user's home directory.
356 While primarily useful when adding a new account with
358 this may also be of use when moving an existing user's home directory elsewhere on
360 The new home directory is populated with the contents of the
362 directory, which typically contains a set of shell configuration files that the
363 user may personalize to taste.
366 is used on an account with
368 any existing configuration files in the user's home directory are
370 overwritten with the prototype files.
372 When a user's home directory is created, it will be default be as a subdirectory of the
374 directory specified with the
376 option (see below), and will be named the same as the account.
377 This may be overridden with the
379 option on the command line, if desired.
383 subdirectory, from which the basic startup and configuration files are copied when
384 the user's home directory is created.
385 This option only has meaning when used with
390 Sets or changes the user's login shell to
392 If the path to the shell program is omitted,
398 and fills it in as appropriate.
399 Note that unless you have a specific reason to do so, you should avoid
400 specifying the path - this will allow
402 to validate that the program exists and is executable.
403 Specifying a full path (or supplying a blank "" shell) avoids this check
404 and allows for such entries as
406 that should be set for accounts not intended for interactive login.
410 field in the user's passwd record.
411 This field is not currently used, but will be in the future used to specify a
417 This option provides a special interface by which interactive scripts can
418 set an account password using
420 Because the command line and environment are fundamental insecure mechanisms
421 by which programs can accept information,
423 will only allow setting of account and group passwords via a file descriptor
424 (usually a pipe between an interactive script and the program).
430 all posses mechanisms by which this can be done.
433 will prompt for the user's password if
437 as the file descriptor on which to read the password.
438 Note that this password will be read once and once only and is intended
439 for use by a script or similar rather than interactive use.
440 If you wish to have new password confirmation along the lines of
442 this must be implemented as part of the interactive script that calls
447 is given as the argument
449 then the password will be set to
451 rendering the account inaccessible via passworded login.
454 It is possible to use
456 to create a new account that duplicates an existing user id.
457 While this is normally considered an error and will be rejected, the
459 option overrides the check for duplicates and allows the duplication of
461 This may be useful if you allow the same user to login under
462 different contexts (different group allocations, different home
463 directory, different shell) while providing basically the same
464 permissions for access to the user's files in each account.
468 command also has the ability to set new user and group defaults by using the
471 Instead of adding a new user,
473 writes a new set of defaults to its configuration file,
477 option, you must not use either
481 or an error will result.
484 changes the meaning of several command line switches in the
488 .Bl -tag -width "-G grouplist"
490 Set default values in
492 configuration file, or a different named configuration file if the
496 Sets the root directory in which user home directories are created.
497 The default value for this is
499 but it may be set elsewhere as desired.
501 Sets the default account expiration period in days.
504 the argument must be numeric, which specifies the number of days after creation when
505 the account is to expire.
506 A value of 0 suppresses automatic calculation of the expiry date.
508 Sets the default password expiration period in days.
510 Sets the default group for new users.
511 If a blank group is specified using
513 then new users will be allocated their own private primary group (a new group created
514 with the same name as their login name).
515 If a group is supplied, either its name or uid may be given as an argument.
516 .It Fl G Ar grouplist
517 Sets the default groups in which new users are made members.
518 This is a separate set of groups from the primary group, and you should avoid
519 nominating the same group as both the primary and in extra groups.
520 In other words, these extra groups determine membership in groups
524 is a comma-separated list of group names or ids, or a mixture of both, and are always
527 by their symbolic names.
529 This option sets the default login class for new users.
533 directory, from which prototype shell and other initialization files are copied when
535 creates a user's home directory.
536 .It Fl u Ar min,max , Fl i Ar min,max
537 These options set the minimum and maximum user and group ids allocated for new accounts
538 and groups created by
540 The default values for each is 1000 minimum and 32000 maximum.
544 are both numbers, where max must be greater than min, and both must be between 0
546 In general, user and group ids less than 100 are reserved for use by the system,
547 and numbers greater than 32000 may also be reserved for special purposes (used by
548 some system daemons).
552 option sets the default method used to set passwords for newly created user accounts.
556 .Bl -tag -width random -offset indent -compact
558 disables login on newly created accounts
560 forces the password to be the account name
562 forces a blank password
564 Generates a random password
571 methods are the most secure; in the former case,
573 generates a password and prints it to stdout, which is suitable where you issue
574 users with passwords to access their accounts rather than having the user nominate
575 their own (possibly poorly chosen) password.
578 method requires that the superuser use
580 to render the account accessible with a password.
582 This sets the pathname of the database used by NIS if you are not sharing
584 .Pa /etc/master.passwd
586 You should only set this option on NIS servers.
591 command has only three valid options. The
595 options have already been covered above.
596 The additional option is:
597 .Bl -tag -width "-G grouplist"
601 to remove the user's home directory and all of its contents.
603 errs on the side of caution when removing files from the system.
604 Firstly, it will not do so if the uid of the account being removed is also used by
605 another account on the system, and the 'home' directory in the password file is
606 a valid path that commences with the character
608 Secondly, it will only remove files and directories that are actually owned by
609 the user, or symbolic links owned by anyone under the user's home directory.
610 Finally, after deleting all contents owned by the user only empty directories
612 If any additional cleanup work is required, this is left to the administrator.
615 Mail spool files and crontabs are always removed when an account is deleted as these
616 are unconditionally attached to the user name.
617 Jobs queued for processing by
619 are also removed if the user's uid is unique (not also used by another account on the
624 command allows viewing of an account in one of two formats.
625 By default, the format is identical to the format used in
626 .Pa /etc/master.passwd
627 with the password field replaced with a
633 outputs the account details in a more human readable form.
636 option lists all users currently on file.
640 returns the next available user and group ids separated by a colon.
641 This is normally of interest only to interactive scripts or front-ends
650 options (explained at the start of the previous section) are available
651 with the group manipulation commands.
652 Other common options to all group-related commands are:
653 .Bl -tag -width "-m newmembers"
655 Specifies the group name.
657 Specifies the group numeric id.
659 As with the account name and id fields, you will usually only need
660 to supply one of these, as the group name implies the uid and vice
662 You will only need to use both when setting a specific group id
663 against a new group or when changing the uid of an existing group.
664 .It Fl M Ar memberlist
665 This option provides an alternative way to add existing users to a
666 new group (in groupadd) or replace an existing membership list (in
669 is a comma separated list of valid and existing user names or uids.
670 .It Fl m Ar newmembers
673 this option allows the
675 of existing users to a group without first replacing the existing list of
677 Login names or user ids may be used, and duplicated users are automatically
678 and silently eliminated.
684 option that allows allocation of an existing group id to new group.
685 The default action is to reject an attempt to add a group, and this option overrides
686 the check for duplicate group ids.
687 There is rarely any need to duplicate a group id.
691 command adds one additonal option:
693 .Bl -tag -width "-m newmembers"
695 This option allows changing of an existing group name to
697 The new name must not already exist, and any attempt to duplicate an existing group
698 name will be rejected.
709 to specify the group id.
713 returns the next available group id on standard output.
716 returns EXIT_SUCCESS on successful operation, otherwise one of the
717 following exit codes defined by
724 Command line syntax errors (invalid keyword, unknown option)
729 Attempting to run one of the update modes as non-root.
734 Memory allocation error.
736 Read error from password file descriptor.
741 Bad or invalid data provided or missing on the command line or
742 via the password flie descriptor.
744 Attempted to remove, rename root account or change its uid.
749 Skeleton directory is invalid or does not exist.
751 Base home directory is invalid or does not exist.
753 Invalid or non-existant shell specified.
758 User, user id, group or group id specified does not exist.
760 User or group recorded added or modified unexpectedly disappeared.
765 No more group or user ids available within specified range.
770 Unable to rewrite configuration file.
772 Error updating group or user database files.
774 Update error for passwd or group database files.
779 No base home directory configured.
784 For a summary of options available with each command, you can use
785 .Dl pw [command] help
788 lists all available options for the useradd operation.
791 allows 8-bit characters in the passwd gecos field (user's full name,
792 office, work and home phone number subfields), but disallows them in
793 user login and group names.
794 Use 8-bit characters with caution, as connection to the internet will
795 require that your mail transport program supports 8BITMIME, and will
796 convert headers containing 8-bit characters to 7-bit quoted-printable
800 Use of 8-bit characters in the gecos field should be used in
801 conjunction with the user's default locale and character set
802 and should not be implemented without their use.
803 Using 8-bit characters may also affect other
804 programs that transmit the contents of the gecos field over the
807 and a small number of tcpip clients, such as irc, where fullnames
808 specified in the passwd file may be used by default.
810 .Bl -tag -width /etc/master.passwd.new -compact
811 .It Pa /etc/master.passwd
814 A Version 7 format password file
815 .It Pa /etc/login.conf
816 The user capabilities database
819 .It Pa /etc/master.passwd.new
820 Temporary copy of the master password file
821 .It Pa /etc/passwd.new
822 Temporary copy of the Version 7 password file
823 .It Pa /etc/group.new
824 Temporary copy of the group file
826 Pw default options file
839 was written to mimic many of the options used in the SYSV
841 support suite, but is modified for passwd and group fields specific to
844 operating system, and combines all of the major elements
845 into a single command.
git.ckatri.com / pw-darwin.git / blob