GETPW

Section: Linux Programmer's Manual (3)
Updated: 2017-09-15
Index Return to Main Contents

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NAME

getpw - reconstruct password line entry  

SYNOPSIS

#define _GNU_SOURCE             /* See feature_test_macros(7) */
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <pwd.h>

int getpw(uid_t uid, char *buf);

 

DESCRIPTION

The getpw() function reconstructs the password line entry for the given user ID 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;       /* username */
    char   *pw_passwd;     /* user password */
    uid_t   pw_uid;        /* user ID */
    gid_t   pw_gid;        /* group ID */
    char   *pw_gecos;      /* user information */
    char   *pw_dir;        /* home directory */
    char   *pw_shell;      /* shell program */ };

For more information about the fields of this structure, see passwd(5).  

RETURN VALUE

The getpw() function returns 0 on success; on error, it returns -1, and errno is set to indicate the error.

If uid is not found in the password database, getpw() returns -1, sets errno to 0, and leaves buf unchanged.  

ERRORS

0 or ENOENT

No user corresponding to uid.

EINVAL

buf is NULL.

ENOMEM

Insufficient memory to allocate passwd structure.

 

FILES

/etc/passwd

password database file

 

ATTRIBUTES

For an explanation of the terms used in this section, see attributes(7).

Interface	Attribute	Value
getpw()	Thread safety	MT-Safe locale

 

CONFORMING TO

SVr2.  

BUGS

The getpw() function is dangerous as it may overflow the provided buffer buf. It is obsoleted by getpwuid(3).  

SEE ALSO

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

COLOPHON

This page is part of release 4.13 of the Linux man-pages project. A description of the project, information about reporting bugs, and the latest version of this page, can be found at https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.

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Index

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

RETURN VALUE

ERRORS

FILES

ATTRIBUTES

CONFORMING TO

BUGS

SEE ALSO

COLOPHON