Removing a user.

On Thu, Feb 13, 2003 at 05:25:21PM -0700, Michael Havens wrote:
/_Nevermind... I found the GUI methid. Some idiot put it in the control panel!
/_DUHHHHHHH.

If you want to close the case because you found a GUI, GREAT. However,
I think it is important to point out that the equivalent, from the CLI,
would have still worked.

What I believe was the problem distills down to two things:

1. mis-spelling of the command. ('usrdel' versus 'userdel')

2. having that command in your path. Issuing a command that
would result in removing a user from a system requires
'root' privileges. Only when you 'su' to root properly do
you obtain the path (e.g /sbin; /usr/sbin) and the coresponding
programs available to the 'root' user.

Some programs are smater than others: Issuing the command (as a normal user
on my system)
:>/usr/sbin/userdel meg

yields the following on my system

userdel: user meg is currently logged in

Now, even if I would have replaced my username with something like
a standard user 'nobody', the program would still not have told me
I had to be root to perform the action. The important part is that I specified
the entire path to the program on my system (/usr/sbin/userdel).

The short part of the stick is that having a command in your path
can mean all the differance in the world. Even doing a 'locate', like
some have pointed out in the past couple days, does mean sh*t: The locate
database may not be properly updated and current.

Anyway, I've flogged the horse enough: 1. make sure you spell the command correctly,
& 2, make sure it (the command) is in your path.

v/r
-Mike