User logins

[Chris DePetro]

This is probably a stupid question, but is there any way to use a number, such as '22061', and a login? The previous admin had chosen first initial last name, but we keep running into the 8 character limit for logins. Also, I am starting to have to use middle initials for people when someone already exists with the same first initial last name.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance.

[Rodney Hills]

You could use a number, but some utilities allow a name or userid nbr and the utility would assume that a all number value would always be a userid nbr.

-- Rod Hills

[Pete Randall]

We used to use the first initial/last name, too but got tired of having to change logins every time one of the female users got married/divorced. We now use the first name followed by a number - john1, for example.


Pete

[Gordon Morrison]

We use the staff ID number as both the login name and UID.
A staff number here is a letter followed by 5 digits. e.g. A12345
So that user's login name is A12345 and their UID is 12345
Not very personal, but unique and guaranteed not to change with marital status!

[Rick Garland]

Typically need to use an alpha character as the 1st character in the passwd file. From there you can have numbers.

[James George_1]

Hi

We use the alpha / numeric combination.

eg : f002306

You can take the First char of first name and then some numbers.

Rgds / James

[Geoff Wild]

Sure - you can use almost anything - there are a few restrictions on certain characters - but numbers are fine.

I like the idea of say, first initial, then say 7 numbers.


Rgds...Geoff

[A. Clay Stephenson]

I really dislike cryptic logins. They make it much harder to spot intruders. Moreover, after a while, as long as the logins resemble the users' names you begin to get a feel for when which users are typically logged on and what subnet they are on. You may have to adopt a new standard for newer users but I would still go with some scheme that at least associates the user with his real name.

[Chris DePetro]

Unfortunately, our organization has decided to standardize on employee ids as the prefered login. Our employee ids consist of 5 numbers (no letters). Useradd will not allow me to create a login with just numbers. I wanted to find out if there was a workaround or configuration change I could do.

If not, I will have to stick with first initial last name, and make special provisions where necessary.

Thanks.

[Geoff Wild]

Interesting that useradd states "Login '12345' is invalid"

You could set and arbitrary first 3 letters - say an acronym/abreviation of their departments, or just maybe just your organization.

acc = accounting
sap = sap group
sys = systems

etc...

Rgds...Geoff

[Geoff Wild]

And yet, from the "Single UNIX Specification" there is no mention at all of numbers not being allowed:

user name
A string that is used to identify a user, as described in user database . To
be portable across XSI-conformant systems, the value must be composed of
characters from the portable filename character set. The hyphen should not
be used as the first character of a portable user name.

portable filename character set
The set of characters from which portable filenames are constructed. For a
filename to be portable across implementations conforming to this
specification set and the ISO POSIX-1 standard, it must consist only of the
following characters:


A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 . _ -

The last three characters are the period, underscore and hyphen characters,
respectively. The hyphen must not be used as the first character of a
portable filename. Upper- and lower-case letters retain their unique
identities between conforming implementations. In the case of a portable
pathname, the slash character may also be used.


Rgds...Geoff

[Anthony Villanueva]

Hi chris,

why dont you try using the users initials like for example if your middle initial is "A" then your userid would be "cad12345" since you also mentioned that your company wants to use those 5-digit numbers.

just a thought...

[Chris DePetro]

Ironically, that is exactly the way the system was setup initially. People complained and it was changed to first initial last name before my time. Now, they want to use employee ids due to increasing workarounds. Most of applications have been changed to this format. I am just trying to comply with the rest of the organization.

Thanks for all of your help and suggestions.