Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!ptsfa!lll-tis!mordor!sri-spam!sri-unix!teknowledge-vaxc!mkhaw
From: mkhaw@teknowledge-vaxc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Passwords in /etc/group
Message-ID: <14459@teknowledge-vaxc.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 8-Jul-87 15:49:02 EDT
Article-I.D.: teknowle.14459
Posted: Wed Jul  8 15:49:02 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Jul-87 15:52:34 EDT
References: <399@acornrc.UUCP>
Organization: Teknowledge, Inc., Palo Alto CA
Lines: 20

in article <399@acornrc.UUCP>, bob@acornrc.UUCP (Bob Weissman) says:
-> 
-> In article <2812@ncoast.UUCP>, allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon Allbery) writes:
->> BSD has "vipw".  Sys3, SysV, Xenix, etc. DON'T.  (Someone want to come up
->> with a PD version? --mailed to security@rutgers rather than posted, perhaps.
->> It does decrypt passwords, I believe?)
-> 
-> 4.2bsd vipw doesn't decrypt passwords.  It provides file locking on the
-> passwd file and does a few sanity checks on the "root" entry.

vipw creates a copy of /etc/passwd in /etc/ptmp and edits the latter by using
$EDITOR, or vi if EDITOR is not set.  The "passwd" program observes the
restriction that if a file called /etc/ptmp exists, then it should not try to
update /etc/passwd.  

Mike Khaw
-- 
internet:  mkhaw@teknowledge-vaxc.arpa
usenet:	   {hplabs|sun|ucbvax|decwrl|sri-unix}!mkhaw%teknowledge-vaxc.arpa
USnail:	   Teknowledge Inc, 1850 Embarcadero Rd, POB 10119, Palo Alto, CA 94303