table of contents
USERDEL(8) | System Management Commands | USERDEL(8) |
NAME¶
userdel - delete a user account and related filesSYNOPSIS¶
userdel
[options] LOGIN
DESCRIPTION¶
OPTIONS¶
The options which apply to the userdel command are: -f, --forceThis option forces the removal of the user
account, even if the user is still logged in. It also forces userdel to
remove the user's home directory and mail spool, even if another user uses the
same home directory or if the mail spool is not owned by the specified user.
If USERGROUPS_ENAB is defined to yes in /etc/login.defs and if a
group exists with the same name as the deleted user, then this group will be
removed, even if it is still the primary group of another user.
Note: This option is dangerous and may leave your system in an
inconsistent state.
-h, --help
Display help message and exit.
-r, --remove
Files in the user's home directory will be
removed along with the home directory itself and the user's mail spool. Files
located in other file systems will have to be searched for and deleted
manually.
The mail spool is defined by the MAIL_DIR variable in the login.defs
file.
-R, --root CHROOT_DIR
Apply changes in the CHROOT_DIR
directory and use the configuration files from the CHROOT_DIR
directory.
-Z, --selinux-user
Remove any SELinux user mapping for the user's
login.
CONFIGURATION¶
The following configuration variables in /etc/login.defs change the behavior of this tool: MAIL_DIR (string)The mail spool directory. This is needed to
manipulate the mailbox when its corresponding user account is modified or
deleted. If not specified, a compile-time default is used.
MAIL_FILE (string)
Defines the location of the users mail spool
files relatively to their home directory.
The MAIL_DIR and MAIL_FILE variables are used by useradd,
usermod, and userdel to create, move, or delete the user's mail
spool.
MAX_MEMBERS_PER_GROUP (number)
Maximum members per group entry. When the
maximum is reached, a new group entry (line) is started in /etc/group (with
the same name, same password, and same GID).
The default value is 0, meaning that there are no limits in the number of
members in a group.
This feature (split group) permits to limit the length of lines in the group
file. This is useful to make sure that lines for NIS groups are not larger
than 1024 characters.
If you need to enforce such limit, you can use 25.
Note: split groups may not be supported by all tools (even in the Shadow
toolsuite). You should not use this variable unless you really need it.
USERDEL_CMD (string)
If defined, this command is run when removing
a user. It should remove any at/cron/print jobs etc. owned by the user to be
removed (passed as the first argument).
The return code of the script is not taken into account.
Here is an example script, which removes the user's cron, at and print jobs:
USERGROUPS_ENAB (boolean)
#! /bin/sh # Check for the required argument. if [ $# != 1 ]; then echo "Usage: $0 username" exit 1 fi # Remove cron jobs. crontab -r -u $1 # Remove at jobs. # Note that it will remove any jobs owned by the same UID, # even if it was shared by a different username. AT_SPOOL_DIR=/var/spool/cron/atjobs find $AT_SPOOL_DIR -name "[^.]*" -type f -user $1 -delete \; # Remove print jobs. lprm $1 # All done. exit 0
If set to yes, userdel will
remove the user's group if it contains no more members, and useradd
will create by default a group with the name of the user.
FILES¶
/etc/groupGroup account information.
/etc/login.defs
Shadow password suite configuration.
/etc/passwd
User account information.
/etc/shadow
Secure user account information.
EXIT VALUES¶
The userdel command exits with the following values: 0success
1
can't update password file
2
invalid command syntax
6
specified user doesn't exist
8
user currently logged in
10
can't update group file
12
can't remove home directory
CAVEATS¶
SEE ALSO¶
chfn(1), chsh(1), passwd(1), login.defs(5), gpasswd(8), groupadd(8), groupdel(8), groupmod(8), useradd(8), usermod(8).05/25/2012 | shadow-utils 4.1.5.1 |