Do you wan to List \/ Find users in a Linux system?. Once you have a running server with a given number of users logging into it. Sometimes it becomes necessary to get to know all the users that were created in the server for auditing purposes or just for the sake of scheduled house-keeping. In Linux, there are very interesting ways and utilities that you can ride on to get your users. The following are some of the most used ones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the creation of every user, their details are usually stored in the \/etc\/passwd file. This includes all users including system-related users like root and the like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To view the file, just cat into it and you will get all of them. If the file is too long, pipe it into a less pager and peruse it like a boss! The first column will give you the names of your precious users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo cat \/etc\/passwd\n<\/strong>\nroot:x:0:0:root:\/root:\/bin\/bash\ndaemon:x:1:1:daemon:\/usr\/sbin:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nbin:x:2:2:bin:\/bin:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nsys:x:3:3:sys:\/dev:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nsync:x:4:65534:sync:\/bin:\/bin\/sync\ngames:x:5:60:games:\/usr\/games:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nman:x:6:12:man:\/var\/cache\/man:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nlp:x:7:7:lp:\/var\/spool\/lpd:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nmail:x:8:8:mail:\/var\/mail:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nnews:x:9:9:news:\/var\/spool\/news:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nuucp:x:10:10:uucp:\/var\/spool\/uucp:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nproxy:x:13:13:proxy:\/bin:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nwww-data:x:33:33:www-data:\/var\/www:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nbackup:x:34:34:backup:\/var\/backups:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nlist:x:38:38:Mailing List Manager:\/var\/list:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nirc:x:39:39:ircd:\/var\/run\/ircd:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin<\/pre>\n\n\n\nAs you can guess, you can add filters to get the desired output. To list all users beginning with letter G, just pipe the cat command to grep and you will have your results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo cat \/etc\/passwd | grep G\n<\/strong>\ngnats:x:41:41:Gnats Bug-Reporting System (admin):\/var\/lib\/gnats:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nGorrety:x:1001:1001::\/home\/Gorrety:\/bin\/sh<\/pre>\n\n\n\nUsing getent command<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The getent command displays entries from databases supported by the Name Service Switch libraries, which are configured in \/etc\/nsswitch.conf<\/strong>. If you check your \/etc\/nsswitch.conf<\/strong>, you will notice passwd is configured therein. Test it by running the below command. It should return all \/etc\/passwd<\/strong> entries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo getent passwd<\/strong>\n\nroot:x:0:0:root:\/root:\/bin\/bash\ndaemon:x:1:1:daemon:\/usr\/sbin:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nbin:x:2:2:bin:\/bin:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nsys:x:3:3:sys:\/dev:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nsync:x:4:65534:sync:\/bin:\/bin\/sync\ngames:x:5:60:games:\/usr\/games:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nman:x:6:12:man:\/var\/cache\/man:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nlp:x:7:7:lp:\/var\/spool\/lpd:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nmail:x:8:8:mail:\/var\/mail:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nnews:x:9:9:news:\/var\/spool\/news:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nuucp:x:10:10:uucp:\/var\/spool\/uucp:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nproxy:x:13:13:proxy:\/bin:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nwww-data:x:33:33:www-data:\/var\/www:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nbackup:x:34:34:backup:\/var\/backups:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nlist:x:38:38:Mailing List Manager:\/var\/list:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nirc:x:39:39:ircd:\/var\/run\/ircd:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\ngnats:x:41:41:Gnats Bug-Reporting System (admin):\/var\/lib\/gnats:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin<\/pre>\n\n\n\nIt can also be piped to grep for filteration. To return all entries containing letter t, do:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo getent passwd | grep t<\/strong>\n\nroot:x:0:0:root:\/root:\/bin\/bash\nwww-data:x:33:33:www-data:\/var\/www:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nlist:x:38:38:Mailing List Manager:\/var\/list:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\ngnats:x:41:41:Gnats Bug-Reporting System (admin):\/var\/lib\/gnats:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nnobody:x:65534:65534:nobody:\/nonexistent:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nsystemd-network:x:100:102:systemd Network Management,,,:\/run\/systemd\/netif:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nsystemd-resolve:x:101:103:systemd Resolver,,,:\/run\/systemd\/resolve:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\nmessagebus:x:103:107::\/nonexistent:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\n_apt:x:104:65534::\/nonexistent:\/usr\/sbin\/nologin\npollinate:x:110:1::\/var\/cache\/pollinate:\/bin\/false\ntech:x:1000:1000:,,,:\/home\/tech:\/usr\/bin\/zsh\nGorrety:x:1001:1001::\/home\/Gorrety:\/bin\/sh<\/pre>\n\n\n\nTo return entries for a specific user, do<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo getent passwd Gorrety<\/strong>\n\nGorrety:x:1001:1001::\/home\/Gorrety:\/bin\/sh<\/pre>\n\n\n\nGetent can list all users with their UID in a given range. For example, to list all users with UID from 900 to 2000, do:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo getent passwd {900..2000}<\/strong>\n\ntech:x:1000:1000:,,,:\/home\/tech:\/usr\/bin\/zsh\nGorrety:x:1001:1001::\/home\/Gorrety:\/bin\/sh<\/pre>\n\n\n\nUsing the users utility<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
users<\/em> prints the user names of users currently logged in to the current host<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ sudo users<\/strong>\ntech jkiiru jmwang root<\/pre>\n\n\n\nConclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Listing users will never be a problem anymore. Note that you can add other filters to the getent command to either list the first column of the file or whatever you would wish to achieve. The guide was a basic way to check the users in the system and we hope it was fun. Check out other interesting guides below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How To use Linux chown command with examples<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
How to use scp command to securely transfer files with examples<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Top 10 Free Backup software for Linux<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
netstat vs ss usage guide on Linux<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
How to use rsync command on Linux\/Unix with examples<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
How To Change SSH Port on CentOS \/ RHEL & Fedora With SELinux<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Introduction Do you wan to List \/ Find users in a Linux system?. Once you have a running server with a given number of users logging into it. Sometimes it becomes necessary to get to know all the users that were created in the server for auditing purposes or just for the sake of scheduled … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":26859,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[299,50],"tags":[13157,4110],"class_list":["post-23595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-how-to","category-linux-tutorials","tag-passwd","tag-users"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23595","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23595"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23595\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162916,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23595\/revisions\/162916"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/computingforgeeks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}