getpwnam

Get information about the user with a given name

Synopsis:

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <pwd.h>

int getpwnam_r( const char *name, 
                struct passwd *pwd, 
                char *buffer, 
                size_t bufsize, 
                struct passwd **result );

Arguments:

name: The name of the user whose entry you want to find.
pwd: A pointer to a passwd structure where the function can store the entry.
buffer: A block of memory that the function can use to allocate storage referenced by the passwd structure. You can determine the maximum size needed for this buffer by calling sysconf() with an argument of _SC_GETPW_R_SIZE_MAX.
bufsize: The size of the block that buffer points to, in characters.
result: The address of a pointer to a passwd structure. If getpwnam_r() finds the entry, it stores a pointer to pwd in the location indicated by result; otherwise the function stores a NULL pointer there.

Library:

libc

Use the -l c option to qcc to link against this library. This library is usually included automatically.

Description:

The getpwnam_r() function is a reentrant version of getpwnam(). It gets information about the user with the given name.

The getpwnam_r() function updates the passwd structure pointed to by pwd and stores a pointer to that structure at the location pointed by result. The structure contains an entry from the user database with the given name.

The function stores a NULL pointer at the location pointed by result on error or if it can't find the requested entry.

Returns:

Zero for success, or an error number:

ERANGE: Insufficient storage was supplied via buffer and bufsize to contain the resulting passwd structure.

The getpwnam_r() function can also return any error code that the following functions indicate:

Classification:

POSIX 1003.1

Safety:
Cancellation point	Yes
Interrupt handler	No
Signal handler	No
Thread	Yes