I just did a fresh install of Gentoo Linux on an Athlon system. I've used previous release candidates (RC3, I believe) and had no problems, but with RC4, the useradd (or adduser) command refuses to create a user's home directory in /home. I've confirmed that /etc/default/useradd exists and contains rational information. /etc/skel contains the default .bashrc that users are to get. If there is a different or better command line user administration tool, it's not documented. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Start with a fresh install of Gentoo 1.4 RC4 2. Log in as root 3. Do a "useradd testuser" 4. Check /home -- there will be NO evidence of a home directory for testuser 5. Attempting to invoke useradd with the -p option (to specify a user's initial password) likewise fails. Actual Results: useradd seems to take no steps toward actual user account creation except to place an entry in /etc/passwd Expected Results: A new home directory for testuser should have appeared in /home, and the user's home directory should have been populated with the seed files from /etc/skel. Portage 2.0.47-r10 (default-x86-1.4, gcc-3.2.2, glibc-2.3.1-r4) ================================================================= System uname: 2.4.20-gentoo-r2 i686 AMD Athlon(tm) Processor GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://gentoo.oregonstate.edu/ http://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/ distributions/gentoo" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /var/qmail/control /usr/share/config /usr/kde/2/share/config /usr/ kde/3/share/config" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/gconf /etc/env.d" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR_OVERLAY="" USE="x86 oss apm gpm libg++ motif nls gdbm berkdb slang readline tcpd pam 3dnow acpi arts avi cdr crypt cups curl dga directfb doc dvd encode freetds gif gphoto2 imlib java jpeg lcms libwww mikmod mmx mozilla mpeg ncurses oggvorbis opengl pdflib perl plotutils png python qt quicktime scanner sdl slp spell ssl svga tiff truetype usb wmf X xinerama xml2 xmms xv gtk kde -gnome alsa zlib" COMPILER="gcc3" CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu" CFLAGS="-march=athlon-tbird -O3 -pipe" CXXFLAGS="-march=athlon-tbird -O3 -pipe" ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86" MAKEOPTS="-j2" AUTOCLEAN="yes" SYNC="rsync://rsync.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage" FEATURES="sandbox ccache"
Whoops. My bad. I discovered that you have to use the -m command line switch to create the user's home directory. Why this isn't the default behavior is beyond me. The -m switch isn't documented until fairly late in the man pages for this core system utility...
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/faq.xml How do i add a normal user? Everyone seems to think that i shouldn't be using root for everyday use, how can i add another user? The command adduser gentoo will add a user called gentoo. The next step is to give this user a password and passwd will do exactly that. Insteed of adduser you can also use: Code listing 2.2 # useradd gentoo -m -G users,audio,wheel -s /bin/bash This will add a user gentoo, will make possible for him to use sound-related devices (/dev/sound/*), will make possible for him to switch to root (using su) and will make /bin/bash his login shell. or emerge superadduser
