How can I get user name by user ID?

Question

In my FTP client I can see files' owner ID (99).

How do I find out which user is the owner of these files?

score 36 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 30 '11 at 22:09

36

Shorter getent version (as long as you don't need just the username)

$ getent passwd 99
nobody:x:99:99:Nobody:/:/sbin/nologin

Works on at least CentOS 5.6 - will take username or uid as key.

answered Apr 30 '11 at 22:09

Paul Haldane

Interestingly enough centos has done something wierd and user 48 is not listed in passwd. – Kendrick Jan 02 '13 at 03:34

score 12 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 30 '11 at 09:39

12

$ getent passwd | awk -F: '$3 == 99 { print $1 }'
nobody

answered Apr 30 '11 at 09:39

score 7 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 30 '11 at 09:38

7

The quickest way to check it (if you have a shell access) is to: cat /etc/passwd | grep 99

Btw UID 99 usually belongs to "nobody" user.

answered Apr 30 '11 at 09:38

Piotr

8

getent is a better answer because it works even if the userid is coming from NIS. – Paul Tomblin Apr 30 '11 at 10:37

3 Answers3