Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 22:17:37 -0800 From: Garrett Cooper <youshi10@u.washington.edu> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: how do I (non-interactively) change a users password in a script ? Message-ID: <43CC8C01.2020703@u.washington.edu> In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.21.0601170101390.8684-100000@shell.dhp.com> References: <Pine.LNX.4.21.0601170101390.8684-100000@shell.dhp.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
user wrote:
> /bin/sh script.
>
> Need to change a users password within the script based on a file of
> user/pass I am feeding the script.
>
> Easy.
>
> Except the passwd command does not seem to be able to take a password as
> an argument - I don't think that the passwd command can run
> non-interactively.
>
> So how is this done ? It looks like the adduser script does it
> non-interactively somehow ... but I don't see how.
>
> Thanks.
>
Yes, you can do this:
-h fd This option provides a special interface by which
interac-
tive scripts can set an account password using pw.
Because
the command line and environment are fundamentally
insecure
mechanisms by which programs can accept information, pw
will only allow setting of account and group
passwords via
a file descriptor (usually a pipe between an interactive
script and the program). sh, bash, ksh and perl all pos-
sess mechanisms by which this can be done.
Alternatively,
pw will prompt for the user's password if -h 0 is given,
nominating stdin as the file descriptor on which to read
the password. Note that this password will be read only
once and is intended for use by a script rather than for
interactive use. If you wish to have new password
confir-
mation along the lines of passwd(1), this must be imple-
mented as part of an interactive script that calls pw.
If a value of `-' is given as the argument fd, then the
password will be set to `*', rendering the account
inacces-
sible via password-based login.
Read more in man 8 pw.
I'm also sure that there are examples out there as well if you
search on Google, etc.
-Garrett
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?43CC8C01.2020703>