[svlug] "webmaster" username

[Greg Herlein]

Why SuSE dis-allows "webmaster" as a user name is silly.  It's
just a field in a flat-file database that makes it easy for us
humans to discern.  UIDs are hard to remember.  

Workaround for email:

1.  add "webmaster" to the /etc/alias file, pointed at the real
user:

webmaster: 	real-user

2.  run newaliases

This will fix the problem with mail - yes, even sendmail will be
smart and resolve the alias prior to delivery. If the webmaster
wants to send mail and have it go out as "webmaster" then rig
your mail composer program to fake the outgoing mail.  That's
easy to do in pine, which is my preference.  Yours may vary.

You're NFS stuff is no worry - that's all based on UID/GID
anyway, and has nothing to do with the human readable username.
you just want the UID/GIDs to match across the NFS space, that's
all.

Comments:

If you have one span of control, ie, one oset of machines that
you are responsibile for, why mix and match distributions?  I
mean, it's one thing to have a play box separate from your
production machines, but if you have to manage a pile of machines
and try to keep them all a) current, and b) running - then it
seesm to me to be a pain to have some SuSE and soem RedHat.
Just my 2 cents, though many will think it not worth that much.

Other comment:

gee, I wonder if you directly edit the /etc/passwd file if you
can make the real username "webmaster" - I bet that your problem
is a lame front end and not some deeper evil.

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Greg Herlein                               gherlein at herlein.com
Herlein Engineering                             www.herlein.com 
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