Appendix E
FILE FORMATS

This appendix provides detailed information on the formats of files used by the user utilities.

PASSWD FILE

The /etc/passwd file contains information about each user. It is an ASCII file which you can read. The fields are colon separated. If the password field is left empty, no passwd is requested at login. If the login_sh field is empty, the /bin/sh is used for the login shell.

The format is:

   user_name:password:user_id:group_id:comment(username):home_directory:
   login_sh

GROUP FILE

The /etc/group file contains information about all groups on the system and who has access to groups other than their primary group. The /etc/group file is an ASCII file which you can read. The fields are colon separated. Each group appears on a line by itself. If the passwd field is empty, no passwd is requested when changing groups.

The format is:

   group_name:group_passwd:group_id:user_names

The user_names field is a list of valid users separated by commas.

OTHER FILES

For additional file formats refer to your system's Section 5 man pages.