System Administration Guide: Basic Administration

Modifying User Accounts

Unless you define a user name or UID number that conflicts with an existing one, you should never need to modify a user account's user name or UID number.

Use the following steps if two user accounts have duplicate user names or UID numbers:

If you do use the Users tool to change a user name, the home directory's ownership is changed, if a home directory exists for the user.

One part of a user account that you can change is a user's group memberships. Select the Properties option from Users tool's Action menu to add or delete a user's secondary groups. Alternatively, you can use the Groups tool to directly modify a group's member list.

You can also modify the following parts of a user account:

Disabling User Accounts

Occasionally, you might need to temporarily or permanently disable a user account. Disabling or locking a user account means that an invalid password, *LK*, is assigned to the user account, preventing future logins.

The easiest way to disable a user account is to lock the password for an account with Users tool.

You can also enter an expiration date in the account availability section of the User Properties screen. An expiration date enables you to set a limit on how long the account is active.

Other ways to disable a user account: set up password aging or change the user's password.

Deleting User Accounts

When you delete a user account with the Users tool, the software deletes the entries in the passwd and group files. In addition, the files in the user's home directory and mail directory are deleted also.