npasswd(1) · carta

NAME

npasswd - change login password

SYNOPSIS

npasswd [ -P ] [ -V ] [ username ]

DESCRIPTION

Npasswd changes or installs a login password for username (your own by default). Only the super-user can change another users' password.

When changing a password, npasswd prompts for the old password and then for the new one. The new password must be typed twice to forestall mistakes. The new password is checked for reasonableness.

Npasswd accepts the option switches of the 4.3BSD and SunOS 4.X passwd but impliments none of them. The -V option prints version and patch level information.

The -P option indicates that npasswd will be fed input from another program via a pipe. This option is reserved for the super-user.

Npasswd can change both local passwords and passwords in a Network Information Service (aka Yellow Pages) database.

Npasswd will not accept passwords that:

Are less than 6 characters long.

Match anything in your UNIX account information, such as your login name or an item from your "finger" data entry.

Are found in the system's spelling dictionary.

Have less than 5 different characters.

Are entirely single case letters.

Fail any of these tests when reversed, pluralized, or truncated.

FILES

/etc/passwd: System password file to be changed

/etc/passwd~: Backup copy of previous passwd file

/etc/ptmp: Lock file for /etc/passwd

/etc/npasswd/npasswd.conf: Configuration file for npasswd

/etc/npasswd/npasswd.help: Help file for npasswd

/etc/npasswd/npasswd.motd: Message printed when npasswd is run

DIAGNOSTICS

Various, hopefully self-explanitory.

BUGS

This program could do shells and fullnames. Probably a future version will. Since it tries to work for a range of UNIX systems, it will without doubt not do everything quite as well as the vendor-supplied version.

AUTHOR

Clyde Hoover
Computation Center
The University of Texas at Austin
[email protected], uunet!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!clyde