useradd suggests --badname when it won't help (username too long)

Question

useradd suggests --badname when it won't help (username too long)

orlitzky opened this issue 2 years ago · 8 comments

$ useradd --badname -d "/home/2022.txindependencehealthplan.com" -m "2022.txindependencehealthplan.com"
useradd: invalid user name '2022.txindependencehealthplan.com': use --badname to ignore

Answer 1 · 2022-10-11T18:31:52.000Z

The length check (< 32 characters) is still enforced. If you drop 3 chars from the username, does it then proceed?

Answer 2 · 2022-10-11T18:34:03.000Z

Yes, but that's the wrong username :)

Answer 3 · 2022-10-11T18:40:53.000Z

Oh. I was thinking this was a regression from when --badnames had an "s" on it, but looking back at my notes, the --badnames was used only to allow the username to begin with a "2". The length was still a problem that I had to hack around in /etc/passwd, /etc/group, and /etc/shadow last year.

For something constructive... I suppose useradd shouldn't tell me to use --badname if it won't help?

Answer 4 · 2022-10-11T18:53:40.000Z

Oh. I was thinking this was a regression from when --badnames had an "s" on it, but looking back at my notes, the --badnames was used only to allow the username to begin with a "2". The length was still a problem that I had to hack around in /etc/passwd, /etc/group, and /etc/shadow last year.

For something constructive... I suppose useradd shouldn't tell me to use --badname if it won't help?

Indeed, that's an unfortunate mis-direction.