bionic (1) runuser.1.gz

NAME

       runuser - run a command with substitute user and group ID

SYNOPSIS

       runuser [options] -u user [[--] command [argument...]]

       runuser [options] [-] [user [argument...]]

DESCRIPTION

       runuser  allows  to  run commands with a substitute user and group ID.  If the option -u is not given, it
       falls back to su-compatible semantics and a shell is  executed.   The  difference  between  the  commands
       runuser  and  su is that runuser does not ask for a password (because it may be executed by the root user
       only) and it uses a different PAM configuration.  The command runuser does not have to be installed  with
       set-user-ID permissions.

       If the PAM session is not required then recommended solution is to use setpriv(1) command.

       When called without arguments, runuser defaults to running an interactive shell as root.

       For  backward  compatibility,  runuser  defaults  to not change the current directory and to only set the
       environment variables HOME and SHELL (plus USER and LOGNAME if  the  target  user  is  not  root).   This
       version of runuser uses PAM for session management.

OPTIONS

       -c, --command=command
              Pass command to the shell with the -c option.

       -f, --fast
              Pass -f to the shell, which may or may not be useful depending on the shell.

       -g, --group=group
              The primary group to be used.  This option is allowed for the root user only.

       -G, --supp-group=group
              Specify  a  supplemental  group.   This  option  is  available  to  the root user only.  The first
              specified supplementary group  is  also  used  as  a  primary  group  if  the  option  --group  is
              unspecified.

       -, -l, --login
              Start the shell as a login shell with an environment similar to a real login:

                 o      clears all the environment variables except for TERM

                 o      initializes the environment variables HOME, SHELL, USER, LOGNAME, PATH

                 o      changes to the target user's home directory

                 o      sets argv[0] of the shell to '-' in order to make the shell a login shell

       -m, -p, --preserve-environment
              Preserve  the  entire environment, i.e. it does not set HOME, SHELL, USER nor LOGNAME.  The option
              is ignored if the option --login is specified.

       -s, --shell=shell
              Run the specified shell instead of the default.  The shell to run is  selected  according  to  the
              following rules, in order:

                 o      the shell specified with --shell

                 o      the  shell  specified  in  the  environment variable SHELL if the --preserve-environment
                        option is used

                 o      the shell listed in the passwd entry of the target user

                 o      /bin/sh

              If the target user has a restricted shell (i.e. not listed in /etc/shells) the --shell option  and
              the SHELL environment variables are ignored unless the calling user is root.

       --session-command=command
              Same as -c , but do not create a new session.  (Discouraged.)

       -V, --version
              Display version information and exit.

       -h, --help
              Display help text and exit.

CONFIG FILES

       runuser   reads   the  /etc/default/runuser  and  /etc/login.defs  configuration  files.   The  following
       configuration items are relevant for runuser:

       ENV_PATH (string)
           Defines the PATH environment variable for a regular user.  The default value is  /usr/local/bin:/bin:
           /usr/bin.

       ENV_ROOTPATH (string)
       ENV_SUPATH (string)
           Defines  the PATH environment variable for root. The default value is /usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:
           /sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin.

       ALWAYS_SET_PATH (boolean)
           If set to yes and --login and --preserve-environment were not specified runuser initializes PATH.

EXIT STATUS

       runuser normally returns the exit status of the command it executed.  If the  command  was  killed  by  a
       signal, runuser returns the number of the signal plus 128.

       Exit status generated by runuser itself:

                 1      Generic error before executing the requested command

                 126    The requested command could not be executed

                 127    The requested command was not found

FILES

       /etc/pam.d/runuser
                        default PAM configuration file
       /etc/pam.d/runuser-l
                        PAM configuration file if --login is specified
       /etc/default/runuser
                        runuser specific logindef config file
       /etc/login.defs  global logindef config file

SEE ALSO

       setpriv(1), su(1), login.defs(5), shells(5), pam(8)

HISTORY

       This   runuser  command  was  derived  from  coreutils' su, which was based on an implementation by David
       MacKenzie, and the Fedora runuser command by Dan Walsh.

AVAILABILITY

       The runuser command is part of the  util-linux  package  and  is  available  from  Linux  Kernel  Archive
       ⟨https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/⟩.