CHPASS(1) NetBSD Reference Manual CHPASS(1)
NAME
chpass, chfn, chsh - add or change user database information
SYNOPSIS
chpass [-a list] [-s newshell] [user]
DESCRIPTION
chpass allows editing of the user database information associated with user or, by default, the current user. The information is formatted and supplied to an editor for changes. Only the information that the user is allowed to change is displayed. The options are as follows: -a The super-user is allowed to directly supply a user database en- try, in the format specified by passwd(5), as an argument. This argument must be a colon (``:'') separated list of all the user database fields, although they may be empty. -s The -s option attempts to change the user's shell to newshell. Possible display items are as follows: Login: user's login name Password: user's encrypted password Uid: user's login Gid: user's login group Change: password change time Expire: account expiration time Class: user's general classification Home Directory: user's home directory Shell: user's login shell Full Name: user's real name Location: user's normal location Home Phone: user's home phone Office Phone: user's office phone The login field is the user name used to access the computer account. The password field contains the encrypted form of the user's password. The uid field is the number associated with the login field. Both of these fields should be unique across the system (and often across a group of systems) as they control file access. While it is possible to have multiple entries with identical login names and/or identical user id's, it is usually a mistake to do so. Routines that manipulate these files will often return only one of the multiple entries, and that one by random selection. The group field is the group that the user will be placed in at login. Since BSD supports multiple groups (see groups(1)) this field currently has little special meaning. This field may be filled in with either a number or a group name (see group(5)). The change field is the date by which the password must be changed. The expire field is the date on which the account expires. Both the change and expire fields should be entered in the form ``month day year'' where month is the month name (the first three characters are sufficient), day is the day of the month, and year is the year. The class field is currently unused. In the near future it will be a key to a termcap(5) style database of user attributes. The user's home directory is the full UNIX path name where the user will be placed at login. The shell field is the command interpreter the user prefers. If the shell field is empty, the Bourne shell, /bin/sh, is assumed. When alter- ing a login shell, and not the super-user, the user may not change from a non-standard shell or to a non-standard shell. Non-standard is defined as a shell not found in /etc/shells. The last four fields are for storing the user's full name, office location, and home and work telephone numbers. Once the information has been verified, chpass uses pwd_mkdb(8) to update the user database.
ENVIRONMENT
The vi(1) editor will be used unless the environment variable EDITOR is set to an alternative editor. When the editor terminates, the informa- tion is re-read and used to update the user database itself. Only the user, or the super-user, may edit the information associated with the us- er.
FILES
/etc/master.passwd The user database /etc/passwd A Version 7 format password file /etc/ptmp Lock file for the passwd database /etc/pw.XXXXXX Temporary copy of the user passwd information /etc/shells The list of approved shells
SEE ALSO
finger(1), login(1), passwd(1), getusershell(3), passwd(5), passwd.conf(5), pwd_mkdb(8), vipw(8) Robert Morris and Ken Thompson, UNIX Password Security.
HISTORY
The chpass command appeared in 4.3BSD-Reno.
BUGS
This program's interface is poorly suited to cryptographic systems such as Kerberos, and consequently Kerberos password changing is not a feature of this program. User information should (and eventually will) be stored elsewhere. NetBSD 1.6.1 December 30, 1993 2
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