auotmated password change and force new pass

[art15t]

I have a -p[assword] option to a script which creates user accounts in non-interactive mode. If this option is passed then the script will generate a random password (saving the info to a 400 perm file owned by root) and automatically set the password.

Is there a way to pass the randomly generated password into the stdin of the passwd command? I tried the usual &quot;<<EOF&quot; and echoing the input via a pipe but can't get it to work.

Any ideas?

 

[art15t]

Just to clarify what I'm looking for is something similar to the following but which actually works

set_pass() {

PASSWD=&quot;`echo $LOGIN|cut -c1-3``echo $RANDOM`&quot;
/usr/bin/passwd $LOGIN << EOF
echo $PASSWD
echo $PASSWD
EOF
}

if [ $POPT -eq 1 ]
then
set_pass
if [ $? -eq 0 ]
then
echo &quot;$LOGIN:$PASSWD&quot; >>$FILE
fi
fi

 

[marsd]

No.
For automating interactive programs the tool to use is
expect.
There is no substitute.

http://expect.nist.gov

 

[art15t]

Thanks for that MARSD!

I compiled and installed tcl/tk/expect. Now I'm able to create accounts on mass(courtesy of Don Libes mkpasswd) unattended. Not an every day thing I grant you but comes in bloody handy when the need arises.

ART

 

[marsd]

Expect is showing it's age,(First extension written for
tcl: 90-91 I think), but it is still incredibly useful for a lot of things.
Scriptable interaction with interactive programs still
causes a majority of the hurdles that people run into
when dealing with automation.