LOGIN(1)						      General Commands Manual							  LOGIN(1)

NAME

       login - sign on

SYNOPSIS

       login [ -p ] [ username ]

DESCRIPTION

       The  login  command  is	used when a user initially signs on, or it may be used at any time to change from one user to another.	The latter
       case is the one summarized above and described here.  See "How to Get Started" for how to dial up initially.

       If login is invoked without an argument, it asks for a user name, and, if appropriate, a password.  Echoing is  turned  off  (if  possible)
       during the typing of the password, so it will not appear on the written record of the session.

       After  a  successful  login,  accounting  files	are  updated and the user is informed of the existence of mail.  The message of the day is
       printed, as is the time of his last login.  Both are suppressed if he has a ".hushlogin" file in his home directory; this is mostly used to
       make life easier for non-human users, such as uucp.

       Login initializes the user and group IDs and the working directory, then executes a command interpreter (usually csh(1)) according to spec-
       ifications found in a password file.  Argument 0 of the command interpreter is the name of the command  interpreter  with  a  leading  dash
       ("-").

       Login  also  modifies  the environment environ(7) with information specifying home directory, command interpreter, terminal type (if avail-
       able) and user name.  The `-p' argument causes the remainder of the environment to be preserved, otherwise any previous environment is dis-
       carded.

       If the file /etc/nologin exists, login prints its contents on the user's terminal and exits. This is used by shutdown(8) to stop users log-
       ging in when the system is about to go down.

       Login is recognized by sh(1) and csh(1) and executed directly (without forking).

FILES

       /var/run/utmp	  accounting
       /usr/adm/wtmp	  accounting
       /usr/spool/mail/*  mail
       /etc/motd	  message-of-the-day
       /etc/passwd	  password file
       /etc/nologin	  stops logins
       .hushlogin	  makes login quieter

SEE ALSO

       init(8), getty(8), mail(1), passwd(1), passwd(5), environ(7), shutdown(8), rlogin(1c)

DIAGNOSTICS

       "Login incorrect," if the name or the password is bad.
       "No Shell", "cannot open password file", "no directory": consult a programming counselor.

BUGS

       An undocumented option, -r is used by the remote login server, rlogind(8C) to force login to enter into an initial connection protocol.	-h
       is used by telnetd(8C) and other servers to list the host from which the connection was received.

4th Berkeley Distribution					 November 27, 1996							  LOGIN(1)