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GETPWNAM(3)                Linux Programmer's Manual               GETPWNAM(3)
NAME
       getpwnam, getpwnam_r, getpwuid, getpwuid_r - get password file entry
SYNOPSIS
       #include <sys/types.h>
       #include <pwd.h>
       struct passwd *getpwnam(const char *name);
       struct passwd *getpwuid(uid_t uid);
       int getpwnam_r(const char *name, struct passwd *pwd,
                      char *buf, size_t buflen, struct passwd **result);
       int getpwuid_r(uid_t uid, struct passwd *pwd,
                      char *buf, size_t buflen, struct passwd **result);
   Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)):
       getpwnam_r(), getpwuid_r():
           _POSIX_C_SOURCE
               || /* Glibc versions <= 2.19: */ _BSD_SOURCE || _SVID_SOURCE
DESCRIPTION
       The getpwnam() function returns a pointer to a structure containing the
       broken-out fields of the record in the  password  database  (e.g.,  the
       local  password file /etc/passwd, NIS, and LDAP) that matches the user-
       name name.
       The getpwuid() function returns a pointer to a structure containing the
       broken-out  fields  of the record in the password database that matches
       the user ID uid.
       The passwd structure is defined in <pwd.h> as follows:
           struct passwd {
               char   *pw_name;       /* username */
               char   *pw_passwd;     /* user password */
               uid_t   pw_uid;        /* user ID */
               gid_t   pw_gid;        /* group ID */
               char   *pw_gecos;      /* user information */
               char   *pw_dir;        /* home directory */
               char   *pw_shell;      /* shell program */
           };
       See passwd(5) for more information about these fields.
       The getpwnam_r() and getpwuid_r() functions obtain the same information
       as  getpwnam() and getpwuid(), but store the retrieved passwd structure
       in the space pointed to by pwd.  The string fields pointed  to  by  the
       members  of  the  passwd structure are stored in the buffer buf of size
       buflen.  A pointer to the result (in case of success) or NULL (in  case
       no entry was found or an error occurred) is stored in *result.
       The call
           sysconf(_SC_GETPW_R_SIZE_MAX)
       returns either -1, without changing errno, or an initial suggested size
       for buf.  (If this size is too small, the call fails  with  ERANGE,  in
       which case the caller can retry with a larger buffer.)
RETURN VALUE
       The  getpwnam()  and  getpwuid() functions return a pointer to a passwd
       structure, or NULL if the matching entry  is  not  found  or  an  error
       occurs.   If an error occurs, errno is set appropriately.  If one wants
       to check errno after the call, it should be  set  to  zero  before  the
       call.
       The  return value may point to a static area, and may be overwritten by
       subsequent calls to getpwent(3), getpwnam(), or  getpwuid().   (Do  not
       pass the returned pointer to free(3).)
       On  success, getpwnam_r() and getpwuid_r() return zero, and set *result
       to pwd.  If no matching password  record  was  found,  these  functions
       return  0 and store NULL in *result.  In case of error, an error number
       is returned, and NULL is stored in *result.
ERRORS
       0 or ENOENT or ESRCH or EBADF or EPERM or ...
              The given name or uid was not found.
       EINTR  A signal was caught; see signal(7).
       EIO    I/O error.
       EMFILE The per-process limit on the number of open file descriptors has
              been reached.
       ENFILE The system-wide limit on the total number of open files has been
              reached.
       ENOMEM Insufficient memory to allocate passwd structure.
       ERANGE Insufficient buffer space supplied.
FILES
       /etc/passwd
              local password database file
ATTRIBUTES
       For  an  explanation  of  the  terms  used   in   this   section,   see
       attributes(7).
       +--------------+---------------+-----------------------------+
       |Interface     | Attribute     | Value                       |
       +--------------+---------------+-----------------------------+
       |getpwnam()    | Thread safety | MT-Unsafe race:pwnam locale |
       +--------------+---------------+-----------------------------+
       |getpwuid()    | Thread safety | MT-Unsafe race:pwuid locale |
       +--------------+---------------+-----------------------------+
       |getpwnam_r(), | Thread safety | MT-Safe locale              |
       |getpwuid_r()  |               |                             |
       +--------------+---------------+-----------------------------+
CONFORMING TO
       POSIX.1-2001,  POSIX.1-2008,  SVr4,  4.3BSD.  The pw_gecos field is not
       specified in POSIX, but is present on most implementations.
NOTES
       The formulation given above under "RETURN VALUE" is from  POSIX.1-2001.
       It  does not call "not found" an error, and hence does not specify what
       value errno might have in this situation.  But that makes it impossible
       to  recognize  errors.   One  might argue that according to POSIX errno
       should be left unchanged if an entry is not found.  Experiments on var-
       ious UNIX-like systems show that lots of different values occur in this
       situation: 0, ENOENT, EBADF, ESRCH, EWOULDBLOCK,  EPERM,  and  probably
       others.
       The  pw_dir field contains the name of the initial working directory of
       the user.  Login programs use the value of this field to initialize the
       HOME  environment  variable  for  the login shell.  An application that
       wants to determine its user's home directory should inspect  the  value
       of  HOME  (rather than the value getpwuid(getuid())->pw_dir) since this
       allows the user to modify their notion of "the home directory" during a
       login  session.   To  determine the (initial) home directory of another
       user, it is necessary to use getpwnam("username")->pw_dir or similar.
EXAMPLE
       The program below demonstrates the use of getpwnam_r() to find the full
       username  and user ID for the username supplied as a command-line argu-
       ment.
       #include <pwd.h>
       #include <stdio.h>
       #include <stdlib.h>
       #include <unistd.h>
       #include <errno.h>
       int
       main(int argc, char *argv[])
       {
           struct passwd pwd;
           struct passwd *result;
           char *buf;
           size_t bufsize;
           int s;
           if (argc != 2) {
               fprintf(stderr, "Usage: %s username\n", argv[0]);
               exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
           }
           bufsize = sysconf(_SC_GETPW_R_SIZE_MAX);
           if (bufsize == -1)          /* Value was indeterminate */
               bufsize = 16384;        /* Should be more than enough */
           buf = malloc(bufsize);
           if (buf == NULL) {
               perror("malloc");
               exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
           }
           s = getpwnam_r(argv[1], &pwd, buf, bufsize, &result);
           if (result == NULL) {
               if (s == 0)
                   printf("Not found\n");
               else {
                   errno = s;
                   perror("getpwnam_r");
               }
               exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
           }
           printf("Name: %s; UID: %ld\n", pwd.pw_gecos, (long) pwd.pw_uid);
           exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
       }
SEE ALSO
       endpwent(3), fgetpwent(3), getgrnam(3), getpw(3),  getpwent(3),  getsp-
       nam(3), putpwent(3), setpwent(3), passwd(5)
COLOPHON
       This  page  is  part of release 4.15 of the Linux man-pages project.  A
       description of the project, information about reporting bugs,  and  the
       latest     version     of     this    page,    can    be    found    at
       https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.
GNU                               2017-09-15                       GETPWNAM(3)