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Manual Reference Pages  - GETPW (3)

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getpw - Re-construct password line entry

CONTENTS

Synopsis
Description
Errors
Files
Bugs

#include <sys/types.h> 

#include <pwd.h> 



int getpw(uid_t uid, char *buf); 

The getpw() function re-constructs the password line entry for the given user uid uid in the buffer buf. The returned buffer contains a line of format

name:passwd:uid:gid:gecos:dir:shell

The passwd structure is defined in <pwd.h> as follows:

struct passwd {
        char    *pw_name;       /* user name */
        char    *pw_passwd;     /* user password */
        uid_t   pw_uid;         /* user id */
        gid_t   pw_gid;         /* group id */
        char    *pw_gecos;      /* real name */
        char    *pw_dir;        /* home directory */
        char    *pw_shell;      /* shell program */
};

The getpw() function returns 0 on success, or -1 if an error occurs.

ENOMEM	Insufficient memory to allocate passwd structure.

/etc/passwd
	password database file

SYSVr2.

The getpw() function is dangerous as it may overflow the provided buffer buf. It is obsoleted by getpwuid().

fgetpwent(3), getpwent(3), setpwent(3), endpwent(3), getpwnam(3), getpwuid(3), putpwent(3), passwd(5)

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