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Phil
Asked: 2009-08-07 10:07:57 +0800 CST

Adduser - home directory set to /

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I added user with adduser user and then entered password with passwd password. When I su - user I got "No directory, logging in with HOME=/"

What's going on, how do I fix it?

linux

5 Answers

  1. Take a look at /etc/passwd and see what the users home dir is set to, it should be the 6th : seperated column

    Use usermod to change his home dir:

    $ usermod -d /home/user user
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  2. Best Answer

    Likely the home directory was not created along with the user. The easiest method would be using usermod:

    usermod -dm /home/USER USER

    Where

    • -d -- Changes the home directory
    • -m -- Creates the home directory if does not exist
    • /home/USER -- where this is the full path to the new home directory.

    So this does not happen in the future you should always use the ‘create home’ option with useradd: -m or --create-home. This will build out the new home directory using /etc/skel as the template.

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  3. It is saying that the directory does not exist, check to make sure that /home/username exists. If it does not then run the following commands

    mkdir /home/username
cp -r --preserve /etc/skel/* /home/username
chown -R username.username /home/username

    This should create the directory for the user and stop the error you are seeing from showing up.

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  4. Maybe your version of adduser doesn't create the new home directory by default?

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  5. In future use the -m switch to useradd:

    -m, --create-home create home directory for the new user

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