Copy all users between systems

[Matthew Seaman]

On 29/10/2010 12:46, Laszlo Nagy wrote:
> I would like to copy all user accounts, including root from an already
> installed 8.0 system to a fresh new 8.1 system.
> 
> My plan is to boot into single user mode, then copy these:
> 
> /etc/passwd
> /etc/master.passwd
> /etc/group
> 
> then run pwd_mkdb and finally restart the system. (Obviously, I also
> need to copy user home directories)
> 
> Will this be enough? Did I miss something?

That should be sufficient, assuming you aren't using NIS or LDAP or some
other userdb.

AFAIR there weren't any changes to the standard system accounts between
8.0 and 8.1, but in general you should also run 'mergemaster -p' to
merge in any such when copying the master.passwd file between different
OS versions.  (mergemaster -p does some other stuff besides merging the
system user accounts, but it's all pretty harmless)

Restarting the system may not actually be necessary, but it's a good
idea if you can spare the down-time.

	Cheers,

	Matthew

-- 
Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil.                   7 Priory Courtyard
                                                  Flat 3
PGP: http://www.infracaninophile.co.uk/pgpkey     Ramsgate
JID: matthew at infracaninophile.co.uk               Kent, CT11 9PW

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