finger [-lmps] [login …]
pinky>
From when people were more willing to share information about themselves.
Recently this is frequently not available.
As with many utilies the available options and output varies with implementation and installation.
finger finger: /dev//pts/1: No such file or directory finger: /dev//pts/2: No such file or directory Login Name Tty Idle Login Time Office Office Phone realger1 pts/0 Feb 22 08:00 (96.242.40.59) realger1 *pts/1 Feb 20 11:01 (96.242.40.59) realger1 *pts/2 Feb 20 12:43 (96.242.40.59)
This terse document describes how to use finger, man pages describe what information it retries.
|
$FINGER favored options
Without arguments output may include an entry for each user logged on.
To look up users on a remote host use user@host or "@host".
-l is the only option that may be passed to a remote machine.
finger behaves as if the user in question does not exist, unless executed by superuser.
finger.conf can specify aliases.
> % finger @dapi2
[dapi2.germans.com]
Your site has been rejected by fingerd
This may be caused by a missing RFC 1413 (Identification Protocol ) identd on your site.
port 113
query: port-on-server , port-on-client
/etc/cfingerd/rejected_banner.txt
finger dgerman Login: dgerman Name: Dennis German Directory: /home/dgerman Shell: /bin/bash On since Sat Jan 21 22:50 (EST) on pts/0 from 192.168.1.31 No mail. No Plan.
[dapi2.germans.org]
Your site has been rejected by fingerd
This may be caused by a missing RFC 1413 (Identification Protocol ) identd on your site.
port 113
query:
<port-on-server> , <port-on-client>
/etc/cfingerd/rejected_banner.txt
/etc/finger.conf alias definition data base /etc/cfingerd/rejected_banner.txt /var/log/lastlog last login data base/etc/passwd
/etc/utmp.nofinger in the user's home directory no information is dispayed..plan, ..project, .pubkey, .pgpkey and .forward.
Aliases used by finger users Useful where a user's login name is not the same as their preferred mail address.
alias name and a target name separated by a colon. A target name should be either a user, a forward reference to another alias or the path of a world readable file.
Where an alias points to a file, the contents of that file will be displayed when the alias is fingered.
/etc/finger.conf finger alias definition data base
EXAMPLES
# @file /etc/finger.conf
# @brief finger alias definition file
#
# Individual aliases. Format alias:(user|alias)
markk:mkn
john.smith:dev329
john:dev329
sue:/etc/finger/sue.txt
#
# Network status message
status:/usr/local/etc/status.txt
#
# Administrative redirects
root:admin
postmaster:admin
abuse:admin
#
# 'sod' is sysadmin.
admin:sod
cfingerd [ -c | -e | -o | -v ]Provides information about each user as described in RFC 1288.
Listenes on the finger port 79.
-c |
Output is configurable.
Per user .nofinger is displayed instead of finger information.
See /etc/cfingerd/nouser_banner.txt .nofinger
Last time: how many times this user is connected, idle time on each TTY and if they are accepting messages. i
If they are
not accepting messages, a [MESG-N] will be shown, the last time mail was
read, and if this user has mail.
Each item can be disabled system wide.
.nofinger in home directories, and can display anything and must be normal files.
Fakeusers execute a shell. See cfingerd.conf(5)
Service listings were used to show what fakeusers are installed.
Searching for usernames or don't know what their name is, use the search.pattern directive.
NOT case sensitive. search for a specific username or real name, for part of the username or
real name, or for a pattern matching the entire username or the entire real name.
May return the names of daemons and users
.plan, or .project or .pgpkey or .xface
@ |
@ |
renice fails (run at the highest priority) "Fatal - Nice died: (reason)".
no input "STDIN contains no data".
A trusted host fingers , a "<- Trusted" will appear.
A rejected host fingers , a "<- Rejected" will appear.
Root is fingered "Root".
service listing will display "Service listing".
a user listing was requested, "User listing".
a fake user was requested, "Fake user".
If "whois" data was requested, "Whois request". (whois is not implememted.
/etc/cfingerd.conf
Subtext of each option is either boolean options, string options, or switchable options, all changeable by the system administrator.
Each section is split into a series of sections that resembles C type definition; not exact, but close enough to be familiar with
it. not case sensitive.
Example:
OPTION section_name = {
(tab/space) string_option = "string_format",
(tab/space) +/-boolean_pair_option = [BOOL, BOOL],
(tab/space) +/-internal_config_option
(tab/space) host.name.here
}
This illustrates that string options are strings put into "quotes", boolean options are given as TRUE and FALSE, switchable options are given with the + or - directive, and hostnames are used as substrings, so that wildcards are not necessary.
A few sections contain text as indicated by the section name .
``#''
DISPLAY FILES SECTION (FILES display_files)
The first 6 options are relative to the home directory of whatever user was fingered,
the remaining are absolute and should start with a "/".
PLAN |
Each option in this section is boolean. The way this works is as follows: The first boolean option is the setting for a remote
host, or a host that fingers you from the outside. The second boolean option is the setting for the local host, or trusted host.
This is what people from your own system will see.
TRUE means that this item is included in the cfingerd reply. FALSE means it is omitted. Unless otherwise specified these items
only appear if an existing user is fingered.
Each option has a "-" or "+" option. This is for user-overridable options, which will be in the next release of cfingerd. These
will allow each user to manipulate if this information is displayed when that specific user is fingered.
HEADER_FILE displays the header file at the beginning of each finger reply.
FOOTER_FILE displays the footer file at the end of each finger reply.
LOGIN_ID displays the login ID of that particular user.
REAL_NAME displays the real name of that particular user.
DIRECTORY displays the user's directory.
SHELL displays the user's shell.
ROOM_NUMBER displays the user's room number.
WORK_NUMBER displays the user's work phone number.
HOME_NUMBER displays the user's home phone number.
OTHER displays the user's other information.
LAST_TIME_ON displays the last time the user has logged into the fingered system.
IF_ONLINE displays whether or not the user is currently logged into the fingered system.
TIME_MAIL_READ displays the last time that the fingered user has read mail.
DAY_MAIL_READ displays the last day that the fingered user read his/her mail.
ORIGINATION displays the site from which the user logged in (if applicable.)
PLAN displays the user's plan file.
PROJECT displays the user's project file.
PGP displays the user's Pretty-Good-Privacy key file.
XFACE displays the user's XFACE file.
NO_NAME_BANNER displays the banner if no username was given.
REJECTED_BANNER displays the rejected banner file if the site fingering your system was in the banned-site listing.
SYSTEM_LIST displays the system list if one was requested.
NO_NAME displays the NO_USER_BANNER file if no user was selected.
INTERNAL CONFIG SECTION (CONFIG internal_config)
Each item in this section is a switchable option. This means that a "+" before the item enables it while a "-" before the item
turns it off.
ALLOW_MULTIPLE_FINGER_DISPLAY tells cfingerd to add the system finger information from the hosts listed in the system_list_sites
instead of only the localhost. This is useful when you have more than one ISP machine, located in different cities, or even
states.
ALLOW_SEARCHABLE_FINGER allows you to let others outside of your system (or within it) to search for a specific username by using
the "search.pattern" directive.
ALLOW_NO_IP_MATCH_FINGER allows you to let sites finger your system if a hostname could not be matched to their IP address suc-
cessfully.
ALLOW_USER_OVERRIDE will allow your users to override specific options in the FINGER DISPLAY section that you enable. This is
not yet implemented.
ALLOW_USERLIST_ONLY will allow other sites to get a shortened form of the "finger @hostname" response by issuing "finger
userlist-only@hostname". The shortened form does not merge in other computers even if ALLOW_MULTIPLE_FINGER_DISPLAY is enabled,
and omits the usual headers and footers. This listing is only available if the remote user is allowed to query for a regular
system list, so SYSTEM_LIST from the finger_display section needs to be enabled, too.
ALLOW_FINGER_FORWARDING will allow other sites to forward finger requests to a different machine if the user could not be located
on the current machine. (In order to use this option, you MUST have the HOSTS finger_forward option set, and have other sites in
there.)
ALLOW_STRICT_FORMATTING makes the finger display remove all returns between display options. This makes the finger display look
horrible (as with GNU Finger or the other generic fingers) and makes your system look, well, "generic". :)
ALLOW_VERBOSE_TIMESTAMPING makes the timestamp that is displayed (at any place) very verbose. For instance, where it used to
say:
On since Sat Aug 12 03:43PM (PDT)
would now be shown as:
On since Sat Aug 12, 1995 03:43PM (PDT)
(Basically, ALLOW_VERBOSE_TIMESTAMPING just takes up more room on the display field.)
ALLOW_NONIDENT_ACCESS lets cfingerd also accept connections from sites that don't run the IDENT daemon (or RFC1413-compliant pro-
gram.) This is for security sake, and is a good measure against unknown users trying to finger your system. If this option is
enabled, users that do not have identd running on their system (ala Windows users) will be able to finger your system. Systems
NOT running identd will return "unknown" as the user ID, and will thusly not be permitted to finger a user on your system.
ALLOW_FINGER_LOGGING enables cfingerd to use the LOGFILE file to store any logs of activity that happen to your system via fin-
ger.
ALLOW_LINE_PARSING makes cfingerd parse each line of every display file (including the plan, project, and pgp files) for any
cfingerd-specific "$" commands. If any are found, cfingerd will parse these commands and display correct information accord-
ingly. Otherwise, if this is turned off, the display will appear without parsed commands.
ALLOW_EXECUTION will allow users to execute scripts in place of their .plan, .project, and .pgp files. This is used to display
the standard output of another program directly to the screen of the user. Keep in mind that this is a HUGE security risk,
should you choose to use it. It's normally suggested that this remain off, but you can turn it on if necessary. Nevertheless
these programs are called as nobody.nogroup as effective user (while the real user will still be root, but a called program won't
be able to change this back).
ALLOW_FAKEUSER_FINGER turns on or off the fake user option in cfingerd. If you want fake users to be defined, and available to
be fingered, you will want to enable this option. This can be a security risk in some instances if you allow for searchable fin-
gers, and your script calls an execute routine on that variable... But chances are, that'll never happen.
ALLOW_USERLOG will allow users to keep track of who has fingered them, and at what time. The default name of this user logfile
is .fingerlog.
ALLOW_CONFESSION enables two fakeusers "help" and "version" that provide information about the system running. Some people don't
like that so you can turn it off. When fingered the requestor will only see the NO_USER_BANNER so he can't guess that the
fakeuser is supported.
ONLY_SHOW_HEADERS_IF_FILE_EXISTS will only show the header of the .plan, .project, etc. files if they exist. If the file doesn't
exist, the header will not be shown. This saves space on the final output of the finger data.
ONLY_CREATE_FINGERLOG_IF_FILE_EXISTS will only create a .fingerlog file in the fingered user's home directory if one exists (and
is read/writable by the user.) This is to cut down on hard drive space if they don't want a .fingerlog file.
SYSTEM LIST SITES SECTION (CONFIG system_list_sites)
This is just a series of hostnames that you want to finger when displaying a userlist query (finger @localhost) . If you have
more than one system that you want to show, simply put their hostnames in this list, separated on a line by itself.
A good example of the way this works is this: If you have a separate ISP system that you are running on the side, say
"chatlink.com", then I would change my configuration to say:
CONFIG system_list_sites = {
chatlink.com,
localhost
}
Remember, if you are listing only a couple of sites, list the sites you will want to have listed (in order) first. These sites
are required to run cfingerd as well and they must not be offline while fingering. The ending entry MUST be the localhost, or
the finger listing will not include your site. If you include localhost anywhere else in the list, it will stop once it has
reached the localhost entry, so remember to list it last!
For the simple fact that I want to get a user listing from my own machine, and from chatlink.com's system. This would be auto-
matically formatted nicely (ie. sorted and parsed) and would display on the screen in sorted order. This program is usually used
in tandem with the supplied userlist(1) program.
If no system list sites are specified, multiple system sites will not be specified.
TRUSTED HOST SECTION (HOSTS trusted)
This is a listing of the sites that you allow to finger your system exclusively, giving them the same access that your local
users would get. In other words, they are treated as "localhost" users.
Each site that you list in this section should be separated by using the "," character. You can include up to 80 sites in this
listing.
Wildcards are supported in this section, and you may use them in the regex format as well. Any wildcards with "*", "?", or any
other regex wildcard matching character will work. IP addresses will also work. Hostnames are compared case insensitive.
REJECTED HOST SECTION (HOSTS rejected)
This is a listing of the sites that you do not allow to finger your system. These sites don't get to finger anyone (or anything
for that matter) on your system, regardless of what they try to do. In essence, finger is cut off to those particular systems.
Each site that you list in this section should be separated by using the "," character. You can include up to 80 sites in this
listing.
Wildcards are supported in this section, and you may use them in the regex format as well. Any wildcards with "*", "?", or any
other regex wildcard matching character will work. IP addresses will also work. Hostnames are compared case insensitive.
FORWARDED HOST SECTION (HOSTS finger_forward)
This is a listing of sites that are used to forward a finger query to when a finger request was processed, but that particular
user was not found on the associated system. It will step through this listing, and it will search for the user in question. If
the user could not be found, then it will step through to the next host, and the next, until it finds one.
Each site that you list in this section should be separated by using the "," character. You can include up to 80 sites in this
listing.
Wildcards are supported in this section, and you may use them in the regex format as well. Any wildcards with "*", "?", or any
other regex wildcard matching character will work. Hostnames are compared case insensitive.
If you do not specify any forwarding sites in this section, finger forwarding will be disabled for your system.
FINGER STRINGS SECTION (CONFIG finger_strings)
Each option in this section is a string that can be changed to fit your needs when displaying finger information. These strings
are limited to about 20 characters on the display. (If you use more than 20, the finger display will end up looking strange.)
USER_NAME user's username .
REAL_NAME user's real name .
DIRECTORY user's directory .
SHELL user's shell .
ROOM_NUMBER user's room number .
WORK_NUMBER user's work phone number .
HOME_NUMBER user's home phone number .
OTHER user's other display information is show.
PLAN user's plan .
PROJECT user's project .
PGPKEY user's PGP Key .
XFACE user's XFACE file .
NO_PLAN is the string that is displayed if the user doesn't have a plan file to show you and ONLY_SHOW_HEADERS_IF_FILE_EXISTS is
not enabled.
NO_PROJECT is the string that is displayed if the user doesn't have a project file to show you and ONLY_SHOW_HEADERS_IF_FILE_EX-
ISTS is not enabled.
NO_PGP is the string that is displayed if the user doesn't have a PGP Key file to show you and ONLY_SHOW_HEADERS_IF_FILE_EXISTS
is not enabled.
NO_XFACE is the string that is displayed if the user doesn't have an xface file to show you and ONLY_SHOW_HEADERS_IF_FILE_EXISTS
is not enabled.
WAIT is the string that when the system gathers information from other sites for a user listing.
INTERNAL STRINGS SECTION (CONFIG internal_strings)
These strings are changeable, and can be any length you want (within reason). These strings are concattenated into the syslog-
ging display when the appropriate finger has been issued. This section also includes error messages that may occur.
NO_IP_HOST when there is no hostname that matches the incoming IP address. This usually indicates that either the site
didn't register their IP address with the InterNIC, or they are coming from a hacked site.
RENICE_FATAL when the system failed to change the execution priority on the current process of cfingerd.
STDIN_EMPTY when the input buffer on the CFINGERD port is empty. (This should never really happen; it's here for san-
ity.)
TRUSTED_HOST is shown when a trusted host fingers your system. If you do not specify a trusted host, cfingerd will insert "lo-
calhost" into this field.
REJECTED_HOST when a rejected host fingers your system. If you do not specify a rejected host, cfingerd will insert
"0.0.0.0" into this field.
ROOT_FINGER when a user fingers root.
SERVICE_FINGER fake user services from your system.
USER_LIST a system user listing from your system.
FAKE_USER a fake user
SIGNAL STRINGS CONFIGURE SECTION (CONFIG signal_strings)
This section is used in changing the output that is given when a system crashes, or a signal is caught, and reported to the fin-
ger output.
The supported caught signals are as follows:
SIGHUP, SIGINT, SIGQUIT, SIGILL, SIGTRAP, SIGABRT, SIGFPE, SIGUSR1, SIGSEGV, SIGUSR2, SIGPIPE, SIGALRM, SIGTERM, SIGCONT, SIGT-
STP, SIGTTIN, SIGTTOU, SIGIO, SIGXCPU, SIGXFSZ, SIGVTALRM, SIGPROF, SIGWINCH
FINGER PROGRAMS FILES SECTION (FILES finger_programs)
These are the programs that are called when a specific action is take on the finger display.
FINGER is the file that is used when a system user listing is requested from your machine. This is used in the standard user
list and in the sorted user list, so it is wise to use the standard here; this being /usr/sbin/userlist.
WHOIS is the program that is used when a "whois" request is done on a specific user. This is currently not used.
FINGER FAKEUSERS FILES SECTION (FILES finger_fakeusers)
These are the ever-popular fake users that you can create on your system. These users are ones that don't exist (and should not,
for that matter.) These are, instead, treated as normal scripts that can be called for your use.
The format is as follows for fake users:
"fake_username", "Script name", SEARCHBOOL, "script"
where...
fake_username is the name of the fake user you want to request. Make sure that this is a user that DOES NOT exist on your sys-
tem. Keep in mind that if you create a fake username, and that user already exists, the fake username will be shown. If you
prepend '-' before the username, the fake user will not be shown on the list of services.
Script name is the standard name of your script. This is used in the display of your services listing.
SEARCHBOOL specifies whether or not parameters can be sent to that specific fake user. If you decide to use the SEARCHBOOL op-
tion (ie. TRUE in this case), the passed variables are:
$1 - First passed option,
$2 - Second passed option,
$3 - Third passed option, and
$4 - Fourth passed option.
(If more than four options were passed to this, the request will be ignored, and an error message will be returned to the user
that requested the finger request.)
script is the location of your script. It should be chmod 700 and readable only by root.
If you do not specify any fake users, a fake user called "None" will be created. This is a fake user that does nothing, and
calls "/dev/null" for the script.
SERVICES HEADER CONFIGURE SECTION (CONFIG services_header)
This is the display that is given during a services finger. It should be formatted the same way that you want it to display on
the screen.
When specifying the finger formatted options, you should specify them as C formatted strings as well, with the standard options.
This should always be given last in the display.
An example of this would be:
Welcome to this system's services!
User: Service name: Searchable:
-------- -------------------- -----------
%-8s %-20s %-s
Where this would display the above string. Remember to keep the format string last, or a SIGSEGV will result.
SERVICES POSITIONS CONFIGURE SECTION (CONFIG services_positions)
This specifies where in the above display string that the information from a service listing is to go. These numbers can be any-
where between 1 and 3.
USER specifies the position of the username listing.
SERVICE specifies the position of the service full-name listing.
SEARCH specifies the position of the boolean search display.
pinky - lightweight fingerpinky [option] … [user]…
| ||||||||||||||||||||||
| -s | short format output, default
pinky -s
Login Name TTY Idle When Where
jackhill jackhill *pts/0 1d 2025-08-22 22:24 2600:382:7610:11b1::3f3
jackhill jackhill *pts/7 1d 2025-08-22 22:24 :pts/0:S.3
swizzard ??? pts/9 712d 2023-09-11 12:49 tmux(22861).%1
dgerman dgerman pts/11 2025-08-24 12:27 74.105.231.173
sajith sajith pts/13 45d 2025-07-08 20:56 tmux(2580).%0
| |||||||||||||||||||||
finger' program; display user information using utmp file will be /var/run/utmp.