topic standard system users in Operating System - HP-UX

standard system users

Ganesh Balraman — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 04:31:47 GMT

Dear All,

Whta is the use of standard unix users like(bin,daemon.lp,uucp etc).

How this users works.

Thanx in advance.

Regds
Ganesh

Re: standard system users

Peter Godron — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 04:41:35 GMT

Hi Ganesh,
these internal users are used to provide a specific service, for example:
The user lp runs the lpsched daemon, which handles the print requests. Check with "ps -ef | grep lp"

Other info can be found via "man uucp"

Re: standard system users

Ivan Krastev — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 04:42:45 GMT

System users are those used to run services such as DNS, mail, web servers, and so forth. The reason for this is security; if all services ran as the superuser, they could act without restriction.

regards,
ivan

Re: standard system users

Fabio Ettore — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 04:45:17 GMT

Hi Ganesh,

I think you can find an exaustive explaination about these users in the following link:

http://docs.hp.com/en/B2355-90950/ch08s03.html

"Other such entries remain in /etc/passwd because they are owners of files. Programs with owners such as adm, bin, daemon, hpdb, lp, and uucp encompass entire subsystems, and represent a special case. Since they grant access to files they protect or use, these programs must be allowed to function as pseudo-accounts, with entries listed in /etc/passwd."

Best regards,
Fabio

Re: standard system users

Peter Godron — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 03:44:29 GMT

Ganesh,
could you please complete the thread by awarding points to helpful answers and summarising the solution for you.

This will help resolution of similar problems in the future.

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/helptips.do?#33 on how to reward any useful answers given to your questions.