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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.mira.net.au!inquo!bofh.dot!vyzynz!bofh.dot!newsfeed.concentric.net!winternet.com!uunet!in2.uu.net!news1.erols.com!newsmaster@erols.com From: Ken Bigelow <kbigelow@www.play-hookey.com> Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: Re: When is 2.2R due out? Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 23:26:04 -0700 Organization: Erols Internet Services Lines: 60 Message-ID: <31A6A7FC.988@www.play-hookey.com> References: <4lgt27$rme@church.dcss.mcmaster.ca> <DrM8tC.GM@news2.new-york.net> <31A3DC8F.3B2@www.play-hookey.com> <4o2o1o$5d2@jraynard.demon.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: kenjb05.play-hookey.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 2.02 (Win16; I) James Raynard wrote: > > In article <31A3DC8F.3B2@www.play-hookey.com>, > Ken Bigelow <kbigelow@www.play-hookey.com> wrote: > > > >All right, I don't mind admitting I'm relatively new to both Unix and to > >FreeBSD. Could you please enlighten me on how you extended UserIDs to > >more than 8 characters? I found the check in the adduser program, but > >even when I changed that it didn't work right. What else do I need to do, > >pray tell? > > It's not that easy, unfortunately. It's a system-wide limit that's > compiled in when the system is built and you have to re-compile > everything to change it. > > If you want to do this, you'll need the whole of the src distribution > (not just the kernel) and change the line in /usr/include/utmp.h which > says > > #define UT_NAMESIZE 8 > > Then do 'make world' in /usr/src, build a new kernel and reboot. Thanks. I got most of this from another kind soul, found the entry, and started recompiling those elements that use it. I found that most of the utilities that use this have their sources in /usr/src/usr.bin , so when I kept stumbling over more such utilities, I tried to 'make' this whole group, but got caught by an error since tn3270/mset/mset.c wasn't there. Perhaps the 'make world' approach will bypass this; I'll certainly try it, and thanks. > > (NB the limit is set at 8 to be compatible with NIS. If you increase > it, you won't be able to use NIS any more. If you don't know what that > means, you probably aren't using it 8-) No, I'm definitely not using it and have no plans to. > > >I'm starting a new FreeBSD-powered WebSite and would like to be able to > >bypass this limit. > > If you just want to do this to get long usernames in email addresses, > a much simpler way is to set up mail aliases. For example, if you use > sendmail, adding a line in /etc/aliases like > > averylongusernameindeed: someone > > and doing 'mkaliases' will result in mail addressed to > 'averylongusernameindeed' being sent to someone's mailbox instead. > Actually, I'm using qpop, which is the POP3 mail handler supplied as a package for FBSD. I also use popclient to suck email from other sites where I have accounts (which will eventually expire), and put it all here where I can reasd it from one place. I'll look into aliasing, but I think I'm really going to want at least 10-character UserIDs, and 12 is apparently reasonable without too much trouble in FBSD. Thanks again for the info! Ken