finger

Display information about a user (UNIX)

Syntax:

finger [-lmps] [user | user@host]...

Options:

-l

("el") (default) Produces a multi-line format displaying all of the information described for the -s option as well as the user's home directory, phone number, login shell, mail status, and the contents of the files .plan and .project from the user's home directory.

-m

Match login user names only, not real names. By default finger will match login names and the users' real names, resulting in multiple matches when the login name is a part of other users' real names. All name matching is case insensitive.

-p

Don't print the contents of the .plan and .project files.

-s

Display the user's login name, real name, terminal name and write status (a * after the terminal name indicates that write permission is denied), idle time, login time, office location and office phone number. This information will be written in a single line for each session belonging to the user matched.

user

The login ID of a user.

user@host

The login ID of a user on the named host. This form requires the optional TCP/IP for QNX product to work.

Description:

The finger utility displays information about a user. The information displayed can include such things as the the login name (i.e. the supplied username), the user's real name, the user's root directory, terminal name and write status, idle time, office location, office phone number, home phone number, login shell, and mail status. It is common for some of this information to be unavailable for any given user.

By default the finger utility also displays the following:

• a "project" -- the contents of a file called .project
• a "plan" -- the contents of a file called .plan. These files are displayed only if they exist in the named user's home directory and if the invoking user has read permission.

  The full user name in the In real life field is the first portion of the comment field for that user in the /etc/passwd file, up to the first comma in that field (or up to the end of the field if there's no comma). Additional information after a comma is displayed on a separate comment line.

When no user or user@host is specified, all users logged in to the system are displayed in -s format.

When @host is specified, the users currently logged in to host will be listed in -s format.

Examples:

Display information about user eric:

    finger eric

Files:

/etc/passwd

Password file; defines userids in use on the system and home directory locations.

/etc/acclog

Account log; tracks login time information (done by login).

(username's home directory)/.lastlogin

Information on last login, includes tty.

(username's home directory)/.project

User's project description (one line)

(username's home directory)/.plan

User's plan (multiple lines)

See also:

passwd, login