pdbedit — manage the SAM database (Database of Samba Users)
pdbedit [-L] [-v] [-w] [-u username] [-f fullname] [-h homedir] [-D drive] [-S script] [-p profile] [-a] [-m] [-r] [-x] [-i passdb-backend] [-e passdb-backend] [-b passdb-backend] [-g] [-d debuglevel] [-s configfile] [-P account-policy] [-C value] [-c account-control]
This tool is part of the samba(7) suite.
The pdbedit program is used to manage the users accounts stored in the sam database and can only be run by root.
The pdbedit tool uses the passdb modular interface and is independent from the kind of users database used (currently there are smbpasswd, ldap, nis+ and tdb based and more can be added without changing the tool).
There are five main ways to use pdbedit: adding a user account, removing a user account, modifing a user account, listing user accounts, importing users accounts.
This option lists all the user accounts present in the users database. This option prints a list of user/uid pairs separated by the ':' character.
Example: pdbedit -L
sorce:500:Simo Sorce samba:45:Test User
This option enables the verbose listing format. It causes pdbedit to list the users in the database, printing out the account fields in a descriptive format.
Example: pdbedit -L -v
--------------- username: sorce user ID/Group: 500/500 user RID/GRID: 2000/2001 Full Name: Simo Sorce Home Directory: \\BERSERKER\sorce HomeDir Drive: H: Logon Script: \\BERSERKER\netlogon\sorce.bat Profile Path: \\BERSERKER\profile --------------- username: samba user ID/Group: 45/45 user RID/GRID: 1090/1091 Full Name: Test User Home Directory: \\BERSERKER\samba HomeDir Drive: Logon Script: Profile Path: \\BERSERKER\profile
This option sets the "smbpasswd" listing format. It will make pdbedit list the users in the database, printing out the account fields in a format compatible with the smbpasswd file format. (see the smbpasswd(5) for details)
Example: pdbedit -L -w
sorce:500:508818B733CE64BEAAD3B435B51404EE:D2A2418EFC466A8A0F6B1DBB5C3DB80C:[UX ]:LCT-00000000: samba:45:0F2B255F7B67A7A9AAD3B435B51404EE:BC281CE3F53B6A5146629CD4751D3490:[UX ]:LCT-3BFA1E8D:
This option specifies the username to be used for the operation requested (listing, adding, removing). It is required in add, remove and modify operations and optional in list operations.
This option can be used while adding or modifing a user account. It will specify the user's full name.
Example: -f "Simo Sorce"
This option can be used while adding or modifing a user account. It will specify the user's home directory network path.
Example: -h "\\\\BERSERKER\\sorce"
This option can be used while adding or modifing a user account. It will specify the windows drive letter to be used to map the home directory.
Example: -d "H:"
This option can be used while adding or modifing a user account. It will specify the user's logon script path.
Example: -s "\\\\BERSERKER\\netlogon\\sorce.bat"
This option can be used while adding or modifing a user account. It will specify the user's profile directory.
Example: -p "\\\\BERSERKER\\netlogon"
This option can be used while adding or modifying a user account. It will specify the users' new primary group SID (Security Identifier) or rid.
Example: -G S-1-5-21-2447931902-1787058256-3961074038-1201
This option can be used while adding or modifying a user account. It will specify the users' new SID (Security Identifier) or rid.
Example: -U S-1-5-21-2447931902-1787058256-3961074038-5004
This option can be used while adding or modifying a user account. It will specify the users' account control property. Possible flags are listed below.
N: No password required
D: Account disabled
H: Home directory required
T: Temporary duplicate of other account
U: Regular user account
M: MNS logon user account
W: Workstation Trust Account
S: Server Trust Account
L: Automatic Locking
X: Password does not expire
I: Domain Trust Account
Example: -c "[X ]"
This option is used to add a user into the database. This command needs a user name specified with the -u switch. When adding a new user, pdbedit will also ask for the password to be used.
Example: pdbedit -a -u sorce
new password: retype new password
This option is used to modify an existing user in the database. This command needs a user name specified with the -u switch. Other options can be specified to modify the properties of the specified user. This flag is kept for backwards compatibility, but it is no longer necessary to specify it.
This option may only be used in conjunction with the -a option. It will make pdbedit to add a machine trust account instead of a user account (-u username will provide the machine name).
Example: pdbedit -a -m -u w2k-wks
This option causes pdbedit to delete an account from the database. It needs a username specified with the -u switch.
Example: pdbedit -x -u bob
Use a different passdb backend to retrieve users than the one specified in smb.conf. Can be used to import data into your local user database.
This option will ease migration from one passdb backend to another.
Example: pdbedit -i smbpasswd:/etc/smbpasswd.old
Exports all currently available users to the specified password database backend.
This option will ease migration from one passdb backend to another and will ease backing up.
Example: pdbedit -e smbpasswd:/root/samba-users.backup
If you specify -g, then -i in-backend -e out-backend applies to the group mapping instead of the user database.
This option will ease migration from one passdb backend to another and will ease backing up.
Use a different default passdb backend.
Example: pdbedit -b xml:/root/pdb-backup.xml -l
Display an account policy
Valid policies are: minimum password age, reset count minutes, disconnect time, user must logon to change password, password history, lockout duration, min password length, maximum password age and bad lockout attempt.
Example: pdbedit -P "bad lockout attempt"
account policy value for bad lockout attempt is 0
Sets an account policy to a specified value. This option may only be used in conjunction with the -P option.
Example: pdbedit -P "bad lockout attempt" -C 3
account policy value for bad lockout attempt was 0 account policy value for bad lockout attempt is now 3
Print a summary of command line options.
Prints the program version number.
The file specified contains the configuration details required by the server. The information in this file includes server-specific information such as what printcap file to use, as well as descriptions of all the services that the server is to provide. See smb.conf for more information. The default configuration file name is determined at compile time.
debuglevel is an integer from 0 to 10. The default value if this parameter is not specified is zero.
The higher this value, the more detail will be logged to the log files about the activities of the server. At level 0, only critical errors and serious warnings will be logged. Level 1 is a reasonable level for day-to-day running - it generates a small amount of information about operations carried out.
Levels above 1 will generate considerable amounts of log data, and should only be used when investigating a problem. Levels above 3 are designed for use only by developers and generate HUGE amounts of log data, most of which is extremely cryptic.
Note that specifying this parameter here will override the parameter in the smb.conf file.
Base directory name for log/debug files. The extension ".progname" will be appended (e.g. log.smbclient, log.smbd, etc...). The log file is never removed by the client.