Question

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rated 0 times [ 2] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 1007 / 1 Year ago, wed, november 16, 2022, 8:25:40

If you add a user using useradd you get asked to supply some other information about the user (Full name, room number, work phone etc).

Where exactly is this information being stored?
How do you access this information?
How do you edit this information?

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Total Points: 485

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Location: Central African Republic

Member since Mon, Aug 10, 2020

4 Years ago

answered 1 Year ago eanda · Accepted Answer

These are GECOS data, and are stored in /etc/passwd, in the fifth field as a set of comma-separated values:

$ getent passwd pulse

pulse:x:115:122:PulseAudio daemon,,,:/var/run/pulse:/bin/false

They can be modified using the chfn command (preferably), or the usermod command.

I don't know if there are utilities to get a particular field directly, but you can parse the output of getent passwd or finger.