This is sooooo strange!

[Jeremy C. Reed]

On Fri, 14 Feb 2003, Michael Havens wrote:

> It appeared that  the new user I created last night did not have his home
> directory created where I wished it to be placed so I figured I would go fix
> it. I opened the control center and then the user window with the response
> "Cannot lock user lib,
>  file /etc/ptmp or /etc/gtmp exist"

These are temporary files used when modifying the user database. This
usually happens when someone (or something) is adding a new user (or
modifying via vipw, for example) at the same time.

Either wait until they are done; or kill the processes that are just
hanging around (like vipw, linuxconf, adduser, etc.).

Or if nothing is really using it, then simple remove those temporary
files.

   Jeremy C. Reed
   http://bsd.reedmedia.net/

p.s. You may get better response, if the subject line accurately describes
the topic of your message.