lchfn(1)

💅 lchfn(1) — the manual page, but make it cute

okay bestie, so this is lchfn — the little command that lets you change finger information. yes that's really what it's called, we don't make the rules 💀 and no, before you ask, it has nothing to do with what you're thinking.

✨ NAME ✨

lchfn — Change finger information 🫶

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

lchfn [OPTION]... [user]

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

So here's the vibe: lchfn shows you the info about a user that the finger(1) command can pull up — and then lets you change it. That info is usually chillin' in the "gecos" field of /etc/passwd. yes, gecos. iconic name, no notes. 💖

If you don't hand over a user argument, it just uses the username of whoever's running the command. easy. but heads up bestie — if lchfn is run set-uid to a different user, the user argument gets completely ignored. not "maybe", not "sort of". ignored. periodt. 🙈

Now, the prompt etiquette, and this is the part where people get got:

• Hitting Enter and giving an empty string at a prompt? That means "yeah yeah, accept the default value." lowkey the laziest option and honestly valid. 😌
• Wanna erase an attribute — or genuinely use an empty string as the attribute value? Then you type a single dot character. that's it. just . that's the whole secret. iykyk. ✨

🌸 OPTIONS 🌸

• -i, --interactive — asks you all the questions when it's connecting to the user database, even if default answers are already set up in the libuser configuration. so basically, no skipping ahead, we're doing the full questionnaire bestie 🎀

💀 EXIT STATUS 💀

The exit status is 0 on success and 1 on error. that's the whole thing. no in-between, no drama (for once). 💅

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• finger(1) — the vibe-checker for user info

ngl bestie, if you forget the dot trick you'll be stuck in a prompt loop wondering why your gecos field won't clear. write it on your hand. . 💖

libuser · Sep 20 2004 — yeah this page is older than most of us, but she's still serving and we respect her for it 👑✨ mwah, go change some finger info, love u bye 🫶💜