Very Computer

Hi,

First question:

In a simple practice script I have the following line:

mkdir $1/public_html

I want that line to create a directory called public_html under the user's
default home.

As it stands, (as written above), the command line would have to be "sh
nameofscript ~username".

I want to be able to do away with the tilde "~" on the command line.

How can I write the script so that the "~" is put in by the script?

In other words, the command line would be "sh nameofscript username".

The script would then insert the "~" and the system would know that it means
the default home directory.

I tried the obvious: "mkdir ~$1/public_html, as well as some variations, but
no go.

****************************************************************************
*****

Second question:

If I log in as say, user1, and do a command line like this:

echo $HOME

I get the path to my default home directory.

How can I, logged in as say root, ask the system "What is user22's default
home directory"?

Or, "What is user22's $HOME"?

****************************************************************************
******

Thanks,

mkdir /home/$1/public_html

Quote:> Second question:

> If I log in as say, user1, and do a command line like this:

> echo $HOME

> I get the path to my default home directory.

> How can I, logged in as say root, ask the system "What is user22's default
> home directory"?

> Or, "What is user22's $HOME"?

Look in the /etc/passwd. The home directories are there. Or use awk
:-)

$ awk -F":" '/menno/ {print $6}' /etc/passwd

(replace "menno" with the username you'd like to check)

HTH

--
Menno

Except that you are assuming that user's home dir is /home/user
(which it usually is, but not necessarily).  You have given op a way to
find user's home dir in /etc/passwd (below), which could be used here as

    mkdir $(awk -F":" user=$1 '/user/ {print $6}' /etc/passwd)/public_html

or, much simpler just to go there:

    (cd; mkdir public_html)

Putting it in parentheses makes it run in a new shell, so you don't have
to worry about losing your current context.

Quote:> > Second question:

> > If I log in as say, user1, and do a command line like this:

> > echo $HOME

> > I get the path to my default home directory.

> > How can I, logged in as say root, ask the system "What is user22's default
> > home directory"?

> > Or, "What is user22's $HOME"?

> Look in the /etc/passwd. The home directories are there. Or use awk
> :-)

> $ awk -F":" '/menno/ {print $6}' /etc/passwd

> (replace "menno" with the username you'd like to check)

> HTH

> --
> Menno

True again, but I still not see why you would want such a script
after all ;-) If you only want to create one directory for one
single user at a time, you'd be better off doing:

# mkdir ~user/public_html

If you want all new users to have this directory, do a:

# mkdir /etc/skel/public_html

If you want to create a directory for every know user, just go to
the default home directory (e.g. /home/) and do:

# ls | while read USER; do mkdir $USER/public_html;\
  chown $USER:group $USER/public_html"; done

That is, if you only have user directories (no other files or
directories) in that /home :-)

You could also get the usernames and homedirectories from the
/etc/passwd, but please note the daemon accounts!

--
Menno

Quote:>First question:
>In a simple practice script I have the following line:
>mkdir $1/public_html

>I want that line to create a directory called public_html under the user's
>default home.

#!/bin/bash
USER=$1
HOME=`grep "^$USER\:" /etc/passwd | cut -d':' -f6`
if [ "X$HOME" != "X" ]; then
        mkdir -p $HOME/public_html      
else
        echo "ERROR Did not find user $USER on system"
fi

Quote:>How can I, logged in as say root, ask the system "What is user22's default
>home directory"?

#!/bin/bash
USER=$1
HOME=`grep "^$USER\:" /etc/passwd | cut -d':' -f6`
if [ "X$HOME" != "X" ]; then
        echo "$HOME"
else
        echo "ERROR Did not find user $USER on system"
fi

Other variants of the HOME line include:

HOME=`gawk -F':' "\\$1 ~ /^$USER\\$/ { print \\$6 }" /etc/passwd`

HOME=`perl -e "print ((getpwnam(\"$USER\"))[7])"`

HOME=`finger $USER | grep 'Directory' | cut -d' ' -f2`

And my favorite, just because it's SO ugly (and yes, you need both parts
of it):

SED="/^$USER/"'{
        s/^[^:]*:[^:]*:[^:]*:[^:]*:[^:]*://
        s/:.*$//
        p

Quote:}'

HOME=`sed -ne "$SED" /etc/passwd`

                Elf

--
Elf M. Sternberg, Immanentizing the Eschaton since 1988
http://www.halcyon.com/elf/

Today is gone, today was fun.  Tomorrow will be a better one.
From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere.

Quote:> True again, but I still not see why you would want such a script
> after all ;-) If you only want to create one directory for one
> single user at a time, you'd be better off doing:

> # mkdir ~user/public_html

> If you want all new users to have this directory, do a:

> # mkdir /etc/skel/public_html

> If you want to create a directory for every know user, just go to
> the default home directory (e.g. /home/) and do:

> # ls | while read USER; do mkdir $USER/public_html;\
>   chown $USER:group $USER/public_html"; done

> That is, if you only have user directories (no other files or
> directories) in that /home :-)

> You could also get the usernames and homedirectories from the
> /etc/passwd, but please note the daemon accounts!

the daemon acccounts could be skipped by using a test condition that
only reads lines with the UID, $3, being higher than 499.  The first
user created always has a UID of 500.

That's not a certain thing. On normal systems, yes, but I could
create a user account with a lower UID, if I really wanted to.

--
Menno

To answer the above question about why such a script is needed:

I only posted a portion of the script. Actually the script will have several
functions, only one of which is to create the directory mentioned.

It will:

1) Add a user based on the name given at the command line
2) Create a sub directory called "public_html"
3) Chmod the users home directory
4) Chmod the "public_html" directory
5) Move some files to the "public_html" directory
6) Chmod the files moved to that directory

So, as you can see, a script would make things much easier than running all
of these commands each time a new user is added.

/etc/passwd)/public_html

Quote:

> > or, much simpler just to go there:

> >     (cd; mkdir public_html)

> > Putting it in parentheses makes it run in a new shell, so you don't have
> > to worry about losing your current context.

> True again, but I still not see why you would want such a script
> after all ;-) If you only want to create one directory for one
> single user at a time, you'd be better off doing:

> # mkdir ~user/public_html

> If you want all new users to have this directory, do a:

> # mkdir /etc/skel/public_html

> If you want to create a directory for every know user, just go to
> the default home directory (e.g. /home/) and do:

> # ls | while read USER; do mkdir $USER/public_html;\
>   chown $USER:group $USER/public_html"; done

> That is, if you only have user directories (no other files or
> directories) in that /home :-)

> You could also get the usernames and homedirectories from the
> /etc/passwd, but please note the daemon accounts!

> --
> Menno

To answer the above question about why such a script is needed:

I only posted a portion of the script. Actually the script will have several
functions, only one of which is to create the directory mentioned.

It will:

1) Add a user based on the name given at the command line
2) Create a sub directory called "public_html"
3) Chmod the users home directory
4) Chmod the "public_html" directory
5) Move some files to the "public_html" directory
6) Chmod the files moved to that directory

So, as you can see, a script would make things much easier than running all
of these commands each time a new user is added.

Quote:> Hi,

> First question:

> In a simple practice script I have the following line:

> mkdir $1/public_html

> I want that line to create a directory called public_html under the user's
> default home.

> As it stands, (as written above), the command line would have to be "sh
> nameofscript ~username".

> I want to be able to do away with the tilde "~" on the command line.

> How can I write the script so that the "~" is put in by the script?

> In other words, the command line would be "sh nameofscript username".

> The script would then insert the "~" and the system would know that it
means
> the default home directory.

> I tried the obvious: "mkdir ~$1/public_html, as well as some variations,
but
> no go.

****************************************************************************

Quote:> *****

> Second question:

> If I log in as say, user1, and do a command line like this:

> echo $HOME

> I get the path to my default home directory.

> How can I, logged in as say root, ask the system "What is user22's default
> home directory"?

> Or, "What is user22's $HOME"?

****************************************************************************

Quote:> ******

> Thanks,

Thanks!

I thank you all for the answers.

This really sounds like you want to check out the /etc/skel
directory :-) All files from that directory will be created in the
new user's $HOME and, IIRC, chmod'ed automatically.

HTH

--
Menno

eval mkdir ~$1/public_html

Quote:

> Second question:

> If I log in as say, user1, and do a command line like this:

> echo $HOME

> I get the path to my default home directory.

> How can I, logged in as say root, ask the system "What is user22's default
> home directory"?

> Or, "What is user22's $HOME"?

1. echo ~user22
or
2. getent passwd user22 | awk -F: '{print $6}'
or
3. getent passwd user22 | cut -d: -f6

to set a variable to some users home directory enclose one of the above
in backticks

uhome=`getent passwd user22 | cut -d: -f6`

try the following in a script:

#!/bin/bash
uhome=`eval echo ~$1`
echo "result is " $uhome

------------
regards,
Frank Ranner

I'd use the follow (for both points):

#!/bin/sh
home=`grep $1 /etc/passwd | awk -F":" '{print $6}'`
mkdir $home/public_html

As far as I know, you can't expand ~ to *someone else's* home.
(I may be wrong though...)

Lee.