UNIX Desktop Questions & Answers

How would I grep for password file entry without using
grep 'username' /etc/passwd?
perhaps with who?
I want to create alias that will find the password file entry regardless of the user who is using it.

Thanks

use of "id" is fairly portable. You can use that to determine who you are... or you can use whoami. Then, if portability is important, you can use that value (after parsing) to grep into /etc/passwd.

On a Linux box (and some other *ix), you can use getent... e.g.

Code:

getent passwd $(whoami)

the user password file entry in /etc/passwd looks like
Name : Password : UserID : PrincipleGroup : Gecos : HomeDirectory : Shell
this is the format i am trying to accomplish sp if a user was to use the alias they would get this exact file entry with their info

Did you READ my post?

Anyhow.... let's assume you DO NOT have getent first... so a reasonable script might be:

Code:

#!/bin/sh
username=`whoami`
grep "^${username}:" /etc/passwd

One nice benefit of getent over this script would be that multiple sources of auth might be available.... but you DID say just /etc/passwd.... so the above will be sufficient.

No need for an alias here, just put the code above into a script file and make sure it is on the user's PATH.

Or (assuming a normal login took place):

Code:

grep "^${LOGNAME}:" /etc/passwd