getent is a

Unix Unix (; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multiuser computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, an ...

command that helps a user get entries in a number of important

text files A text file (sometimes spelled textfile; an old alternative name is flatfile) is a kind of computer file that is structured as a sequence of lines of electronic text. A text file exists stored as data within a computer file system. In operat ...

called databases. This includes the passwd and group databases which store user information – hence is a common way to look up user details on Unix. Since uses the same name service as the system, {{code, getent will show all information, including that gained from network information sources such as

LDAP The Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP ) is an open, vendor-neutral, industry standard application protocol for accessing and maintaining distributed directory information services over an Internet Protocol (IP) network. Directory servi ...

. The databases it searches in are: ahosts, ahostsv4, ahostsv6, aliases, ethers (Ethernet addresses), group, gshadow, hosts, netgroup, networks,

passwd passwd is a command on Unix, Plan 9, Inferno, and most Unix-like operating systems used to change a user's password. The password entered by the user is run through a key derivation function to create a hashed version of the new password, wh ...

, protocols, rpc, services, and shadow. The general syntax is: getent database ey ... Thorsten Kukuk wrote the ''getent'' utility for the

GNU C Library The GNU C Library, commonly known as glibc, is the GNU Project's implementation of the C standard library. Despite its name, it now also directly supports C++ (and, indirectly, other programming languages). It was started in the 1980s by ...

Examples

Fetch list of user accounts on a Unix system (stored in a database called 'passwd'). This will show all user accounts, regardless of the type of

name service In computing, a directory service or name service maps the names of network resources to their respective network addresses. It is a shared information infrastructure for locating, managing, administering and organizing everyday items and network r ...

used. For example, if both local and LDAP

are used for user accounts, the results will include all local and LDAP users: $ getent passwd root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash daemon:x:1:1:daemon:/usr/sbin:/bin/sh bin:x:2:2:bin:/bin:/bin/sh sys:x:3:3:sys:/dev:/bin/sh sync:x:4:65534:sync:/bin:/bin/sync games:x:5:60:games:/usr/games:/bin/sh man:x:6:12:man:/var/cache/man:/bin/sh lp:x:7:7:lp:/var/spool/lpd:/bin/sh mail:x:8:8:mail:/var/mail:/bin/sh Fetch details for a particular user called joe: $ getent passwd joe joe:x:1000:1000:Joe,,,:/home/joe:/bin/bash Fetch list of group accounts on a Unix system (stored in a database called 'group'): $ getent group root:x:0: daemon:x:1: bin:x:2: sys:x:3: adm:x:4:stefan tty:x:5: disk:x:6: lp:x:7: mail:x:8:

External links

The getent manpage
Unix user management and support-related utilities