Museum

Home

Lab Overview

Retrotechnology Articles

Online Manuals

⇒ pwconv(1M) — Interactive 3.2r4.1

Media Vault

Software Library

Restoration Projects

Artifacts Sought

Related Articles

passwd(1M)

passmgmt(1M)

PWCONV(1M)  —  

NAME

pwconv − install and update /etc/shadow with information from /etc/passwd

SYNOPSIS

pwconv

DESCRIPTION

The pwconv command creates and updates /etc/shadow with information from /etc/passwd.  If the /etc/shadow file does not exist, this command will create /etc/shadow with information from /etc/passwd.  The command populates /etc/shadow with the user’s login name, password, and password aging information.  If password aging information does not exist in /etc/passwd for a given user, none will be added to /etc/shadow.  However, the "last changed" information will always be updated. 

If the /etc/shadow file does exist, the following tasks will be performed:

Entries that are in the /etc/passwd file and not in the /etc/shadow file will be added to the /etc/shadow file. 

Entries that are in the /etc/shadow file and not in the /etc/passwd file will be removed from /etc/shadow. 

Password attributes (e.g., password and aging information) that exist in an /etc/passwd entry will be moved to the corresponding entry in /etc/shadow. 

The following is the format of an entry in /etc/passwd:

name:passwd,aging:uid:gid:comment:homedir:shell

The following table shows how changes made to /etc/passwd affect /etc/shadow when pwconv is run:

name delete old entry from /etc/shadow,
add new entry to /etc/shadow

passwd update password and aging fields in /etc/shadow,
place an x in /etc/passwd

aging update aging fields in /etc/shadow,
clear aging field in /etc/passwd

remaining fields ignore—no change to /etc/shadow

The pwconv program is a privileged system command that cannot be executed by ordinary users.  The passwd command should be used to add or change password aging information or passwords. 

FILES

/etc/passwd
/etc/shadow
/etc/opasswd
/etc/oshadow

SEE ALSO

passwd(1M), passmgmt(1M). 

DIAGNOSTICS

The pwconv command exits with one of the following values:

0SUCCESS. 

1Permission denied. 

2Invalid command syntax. 

3Unexpected failure.  Conversion not done. 

4Unexpected failure.  Password file(s) missing. 

5Password file(s) busy.  Try again later. 

\*U  —  Version 1.0

Typewritten Software • bear@typewritten.org • Edmonds, WA 98026