USER AND GROUP MANAGEMENT IN Linux ENVIRONMENT
Linux machines are initially designed for a personal use, and gradually it is used for most of the super computers and mainframe computers…etc. Nowadays, most of the people using Linux machines through smartphones and tablets because android operating system is based on Linux. Linux machines have a lot of powerfull tools for developers and managing security in a organization, and one of the most essential tool in every organization is an user and group management tool.
USER MANAGEMENT
User in a Linux describes that a person using a system to execute commands and managing the system,..etc. Human have name to identify the person as like that Linux set unique UID for the users to identify the user. Every process and files on the system are based on separate users. There are mainly three types of users in Linux machines,
1. Superuser account
Superuser account is also known as root user which is used to run administrative commands and its UID is 0.
2.System user account
System user accounts are used to provide support for running process and it is a non-privileged account.
3. Regular user account
Most of the accounts are regular user account which is used to day-to-day works and it has access limits.
Gaining Superuser Access
Normal regular users are able to run administration commands with using sudo command. There are two methods are possible to get superuser access,
1. By adding a user in the default group wheel, users in the group can be access superuser by using sudo command.
2. create a file under / etc / sudoers.d directory with any meaningful file name and edit the file using vim editor as
“username ALL = (ALL) ALL”
Password Policy
Linux machines allows root users and superusers to configure the password policy for the normal users. There are two methods to configure password policy
1. By using / etc / login.defs root users can configure password maximum, minimum, password length and warning age.
2. By using command line root users can configure same thing for particular users by chage command.
GROUP MANAGEMENT
Group in Linux consits of two or more users in defined name which is
known as group name and it also have unique group id called GID. There are two types of groups in Linux and they are primary group and supplementary group.
To configure superuser access to the group , create a file under / etc / sudoers.d
and configure as,
“%groupname ALL=(ALL) ALL”
There are lot of management tools and configurations are available in user and group
management tool and I recommend RHCSA online course in Kochi for gain basic knowledge in Linux and online Linux training in Kochi for getting mastery in Linux and understand the management tools in Linux.
