yppasswd(NC)

yppasswd -- change login password in Network Information Service

Syntax

yppasswd [ name ]

Description

yppasswd changes (or installs) a password associated with the user name (your own name by default) in the Network Information Service (NIS). The NIS password may be different from the one on your own machine.

yppasswd prompts for the old NIS password and then for the new one. The caller must supply both. The new password must be typed twice to forestall mistakes.

New passwords must be at least four characters long if they use a sufficiently rich alphabet (that is, a combination of lower- and uppercase letters and symbols) and at least six characters long if monocase. These rules are relaxed if you are insistent enough.

Only the owner of the name or the superuser may change a password; in either case, you must prove you know the old password by entering it.

Diagnostics

The following error message indicates the existence of the file /etc/ptmp: 
   

   yppasswd: password file busy - try again
The file /etc/ptmp is a lock file which indicates a previous invocation of yppasswd. This file can be removed to ``unlock'' the password file.

yppasswd prints error messages to the terminal. If the /usr/adm/nislog file exists, yppasswd also logs the error messages there.

Error messages are displayed in numeric form. If the server is an SCO OpenServer system, the numeric values have the following meaning:


1
The /etc/passwd file on the server does not exist or is unreadable.

2
The name was not in the server's /etc/passwd file.

3
The old password given does not match the password in the server's /etc/passwd file.

4
The server was unable to create a temporary password file.

5
The sever was unable to create a new password file.

6
name was not in the server's protected password database.

7
The server was unable to update its protected password database.

Limitations

The update protocol passes all the information to the server in one RPC call without looking at it. Thus, if you type in your old password incorrectly, you will not be notified until after you have entered your new password.

See also

authcap(F), getprpwent(S-osr5), passwd(C), ypfiles(NF), yppasswdd(NADM)
© 2005 The SCO Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
SCO OpenServer Release 6.0.0 -- 02 June 2005