[BlueOnyx:02646] Re: User names

[Michael Stauber]

Hi Darrell,

> What are the issues that prevent server admins from being able to change a
> user's username (besides the obvious of it not being an option).  In other
> words, why is it not an option?

There is simply way too many places that need to be updated or changed if the 
GUI allowed you to change a user name:

- OS level user and password database
- Sendmail virtusertable
- Mailing list usertable (if the user is subscribed to one!)
- Home directory of user needs to be renamed
- Files and folders of that user need to be chowned to the new username.
- If the user is siteAdmin, /web folder needs to be chowned as well.
- If the user has FTP and userwebs disabled, access files need update.

All in all there is simply too much that can go wrong and that could break 
things. Hence it was left out of the original RaQ550 code and never added to 
the BlueQuartz or BlueOnyx code.

You see: Typically changing a username shouldn't be necessary. If the user 
doesn't like the email address he has, he can setup an alias. Any other reason 
and you're almost better off to simply create a new user and to delete the old 
one. 

-- 
With best regards

Michael Stauber