Re: Change Useradd Behavior

[Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@wowway.com>]

On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:02:02 -0400 (EDT), Carlos Mennens wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 1:50 PM, Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@wowway.com> wrote:
>> First of all, "useradd" should not be invoked directly.  I suggest the
>> "adduser" frontend to useradd.  Second, /etc/profile, the system-wide
>> bash profile, contains a setting for the default umask.  Perhaps this
>> is what you want to change?  Or maybe you want to set the DIR_MODE
>> variable in /etc/adduser.conf?
> 
> I have never heard this before in years or using Linux. I am not
> saying you're wrong but I would just like to know why I should not use
> 'useradd' rather than 'adduser'. I assumed that it was just personal
> preference for which you preferred to use but I could be wrong
> according to your above statement.

>From the man page for useradd on Debian Lenny:

   useradd is a low level utility for adding users.  On Debian,
   administrators should usually use adduser(8) instead.

>From the man page for adduser on Debian Lenny:

   adduser and addgroup add users and groups to the system according to
   command line options and configuration information in
   /etc/adduser.conf.  They are friendlier front ends to the low level
   tools like useradd, groupadd, and usermod programs, by default choosing
   Debian policy conformant UID and GID values, creating a home directory
   with skeletal configuration, running a custom script, and other fea-
   tures.

-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    <zlinuxman@wowway.com>
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