yppasswd(1)		    General Commands Manual		   yppasswd(1)



NAME
       yppasswd, ypchfn, ypchsh - change your password in the NIS database

SYNOPSIS
       yppasswd [-f] [-l] [-p] [user]
       ypchfn [user]
       ypchsh [user]

DESCRIPTION
       In  the	old  days,  the	 standard passwd(1), chfn(1) and chsh(1) tools
       could not be used under Linux to change the users NIS  password,	 shell
       and  GECOS  information.	 For  changing	the NIS information, they were
       replaced by their NIS counterparts, yppasswd, ypchfn and ypchsh.

       Today, this versions are deprecated and should not be used any longer.

       Using the command line switches, you can choose whether to update  your
       password -p, your login shell -l, or your GECOS field -f, or a combina-
       tion of them.  yppasswd implies the -p option, if no  other  option  is
       given.  If  you	use  the  -f or -l option, you also need to add the -p
       flag.  ypchfn implies the -f option, and ypchsh -l.

       When invoked without the user argument, the account information for the
       invoking	 user will be updated, otherwise that of user will be updated.
       This option is only available to the super-user. If the yppasswdd  dae-
       mon  on	the  server supports it, you can give the root password of the
       server instead of the users [old] password.

       All tools will first prompt the	user  for  the	current	 NIS  password
       needed  for  authentication with the yppasswdd(8) daemon. Subsequently,
       the program prompts for the updated information:

       If we use shadowing passwords using  passwd.adjunct,  SHA-512  will  be
       used  for  hashing  a  new  password by default. If we want to use MD5,
       SHA_256	or  older  DES,	 we  need  to  set  the	 environment  variable
       YP_PASSWD_HASH.	 Possible  values  are	"DES",	"MD5",	"SHA-256"  and
       "SHA-512" (value is case-insensitive).

       yppasswd or -p
	      Change the user's NIS password.	 The user is prompted for  the
	      new password.  While typing the password, echoing is turned off,
	      so the password does not appear on the screen. An empty password
	      is  rejected,  as are passwords shorter than six characters. The
	      user will then be requested to retype the password to make  sure
	      it wasn't	   misspelled the first time.

       ypchsh or -l
	      Change  the  user's  login shell. The user is prompted for a new
	      shell, offering the old one as default:

		Login shell [/bin/sh]: _

	      To accept the default, simply press return. To clear  the	 shell
	      field in your passwd(5) file entry (so that the system's default
	      shell is selected), enter the string none.

       ypchfn or -f
	      Change the user's full name and related information.  Tradition-
	      ally,  some applications expect the GECOS field (field 4) of the
	      passwd(5) file to contain the user's real name  (as  opposed  to
	      the login name) plus some additional information like the office
	      phone number. This information is	 displayed  by	finger(1)  and
	      probably some other tools, too.

	      When  setting  the  full	name,  ypchfn  displays	 the following
	      prompts, with the defaults in brackets:

		Name [Joe Doe]:
		Location [2nd floor, bldg 34]:
		Office Phone [12345]:
		Home Phone []:

	      To accept a default, simply press	 return.  To  clear  a	field,
	      enter the string none.

SEE ALSO
       chfn(1),	 chsh(1),  finger(1),  passwd(5), passwd(1), ypcat(1), yppass-
       wdd(8), ypserv(8), ypwhich(1)

AUTHOR
       yppasswd is part of the yp-tools package, which was written by Thorsten
       Kukuk <kukuk@suse.de>.



YP Tools 2.9			   June 2004			   yppasswd(1)