[gentoo-dev] Managing users and groups

[Daniel Pielmeier]

Hi,

I have recently checked the contents of /etc/{group,passwd,shadow} and
found that there are users and groups which are not needed anymore
because the packages which need them have also been removed. I have
deleted some of them which are unnecessary with userdel and groupdel.

I have experienced that some ebuilds use enewuser and enewgroup to
create users and groups which are needed. Some print a elog notice in
pkg_postinst to inform the user to create them manually.

I think it would be a good idea to either leave it to the user (inform
them via pkg_postinst) to create the groups and users or better create
the needed groups and users in pkg_preinst and remove them at uninstall
in pkg_postrm (edeluser end edelgroup may have to be implemented to
achieve this). In this case the configuration files did not get
cluttered with unneeded entries. To be sure that no group or user is
removed which is still needed some kind of configuration file could be
used to prevent the deletion of shared groups/users. With contents like
group/user X needed by ebuild Y.

While writing this i have found GLEP-27. What is the current status
concerning this?

Regards,

Daniel


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