getpwnam, getpwnam_r, getpwuid, getpwuid_r - get password file entry

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <pwd.h>
struct passwd *getpwnam(const char *name);
struct passwd *getpwuid(uid_t uid);
int getpwnam_r(const char *restrict name, struct passwd *restrict pwd,
 char buf[restrict .buflen], size_t buflen,
 struct passwd **restrict result);
int getpwuid_r(uid_t uid, struct passwd *restrict pwd,
 char buf[restrict .buflen], size_t buflen,
 struct passwd **restrict result);

Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)):

    _POSIX_C_SOURCE
        || /* glibc <= 2.19: */ _BSD_SOURCE || _SVID_SOURCE

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 username 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.)

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 to indicate the error. 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.

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 argument.

#include <errno.h>
#include <pwd.h>
#include <stdint.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
int
main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    struct passwd pwd;
    struct passwd *result;
    char *buf;
    long 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: %jd\n", pwd.pw_gecos,
           (intmax_t) pwd.pw_uid);
    exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
}

endpwent(3), fgetpwent(3), getgrnam(3), getpw(3), getpwent(3), getspnam(3), putpwent(3), setpwent(3), nsswitch.conf(5), passwd(5)