DESCRIPTION
The
getent program retrieves and displays entries from the administrative database specified by
database, using the lookup order specified in
nsswitch.conf(5). The display format for a given
database is as per the “traditional” file format for that database.
database may be one of:
Database |
Display format |
disktab |
entry |
ethers |
address name |
gettytab |
entry |
group |
group:passwd:gid:[member[,member]...] |
hosts |
address name [alias ...] |
netgroup |
(host,user,domain) [...] |
networks |
name network [alias ...] |
passwd |
user:passwd:uid:gid:gecos:home_dir:shell |
printcap |
entry |
protocols |
name protocol [alias ...] |
rpc |
name number [alias ...] |
services |
name port/protocol [alias ...] |
shells |
/path/to/shell |
If one or more key arguments are provided, they will be looked up in database using the appropriate function. For example, passwd supports a numeric UID or user name; hosts supports an IPv4 address, IPv6 address, or host name; and services supports a service name, service name/protocol name, numeric port, or numeric port/protocol name.
If no key is provided and database supports enumeration, all entries for database will be retrieved using the appropriate enumeration function and printed.
For cgetcap(3) style databases (disktab, printcap) specifying a key, lists the entry for that key, and specifying more arguments after the key are used as fields in that key, and only the values of the keys are returned. For boolean keys true is returned if the key is found. If a key is not found, then false is always returned.