Specifying Login Shells for User Accounts Command

The useradd command in Linux is used to create new user accounts. One of its options, -P or --prefix PREFIX_DIR, allows setting a prefix directory where user home directories will be created. This is particularly useful when you want to organize user home directories under a specific directory structure.

Here are several examples demonstrating the usage of -P option with useradd:

Example 1: Setting the prefix directory to /home/users:

            useradd -P /home/users john
        

This command creates a new user john and sets their home directory to /home/users/john.

Example 2: Using an existing directory path:

            useradd -P /srv/users alice
        

This command creates a user alice with the home directory at /srv/users/alice.

Example 3: Specifying a relative path:

            useradd -P relative/path bob
        

Here, the command creates a user bob with the home directory at relative/path/bob.

Example 4: Using an environment variable:

            useradd -P $HOME/users charlie
        

This command creates a user charlie with the home directory at $HOME/users/charlie.

Example 5: Combining options with user creation:

            useradd -m -P /var/lib/users dave
        

Here, -m ensures creation of the user’s home directory and -P sets it to /var/lib/users/dave.

Verification: To verify if the user creation with the specified prefix directory was successful, you can check the existence of the user’s home directory using:

            ls -ld /path/to/prefix/directory/username
        

Replace /path/to/prefix/directory/username with the actual path where the user’s home directory should have been created.