users resource

Use the users Chef InSpec audit resource to look up all local users available on the system, and then test specific properties of those users. This resource does not return information about users that may be located on other systems, such as LDAP or Active Directory.

Availability

Install

This resource is distributed with Chef InSpec and is automatically available for use.

Version

This resource first became available in v1.0.0 of InSpec.

Syntax

A users resource block declares a user name, and then one (or more) matchers:

describe users.where(uid: 0).entries do
  it { should eq ['root'] }
  its('uids') { should eq [1234] }
  its('gids') { should eq [1234] }
end

where

• gid, group, groups, home, maxdays, mindays, shell, uid, warndays, passwordage, maxbadpasswords and badpasswordattempts are valid matchers for this resource
• where(uid: 0).entries represents a filter that runs the test only against matching users

For example:

describe users.where { username =~ /.*/ } do
  it { should exist }
end

or:

describe users.where { uid =~ /^S-1-5-[0-9-]+-501$/ } do
  it { should exist }
end

Properties

gid

The gid property tests the group identifier:

its('gid') { should eq 1234 } }

where 1234 represents the user identifier.

group

The group property tests the group to which the user belongs:

its('group') { should eq 'root' }

where root represents the group.

groups

The groups property tests two (or more) groups to which the user belongs:

its('groups') { should eq ['root', 'other']}

home

The home property tests the home directory path for the user:

its('home') { should eq '/root' }

maxdays

The maxdays property tests the maximum number of days between password changes:

its('maxdays') { should eq 99 }

where 99 represents the maximum number of days.

mindays

The mindays property tests the minimum number of days between password changes:

its('mindays') { should eq 0 }

where 0 represents the maximum number of days.

shell

The shell property tests the path to the default shell for the user:

its('shells') { should eq ['/bin/bash'] }

uid

The uid property tests the user identifier:

its('uid') { should eq 1234 } }

where 1234 represents the user identifier.

warndays

The warndays property tests the number of days a user is warned before a password must be changed:

its('warndays') { should eq 5 }

where 5 represents the number of days a user is warned.

passwordage

The passwordage property tests the number of days a user changed its password:

its('passwordage') { should_be <= 365 }

where 365 represents the number of days since the last password change.

maxbadpasswords

The maxbadpasswords property tests the count of max badpassword settings for a specific user.

its('maxbadpasswords') { should eq 7 }

where 7 is the count of maximum bad password attempts.

badpasswordattempts

The badpasswordattempts property tests the count of bad password attempts for a user.

its('badpasswordattempts') { should eq 0 }

where 0 is the count of bad passwords for a user. On Linux based operating systems it relies on lastb and for Windows it uses information stored for the user object. These settings will reset to 0 depending on your operating system configuration.

Examples

The following examples show how to use this Chef InSpec audit resource.

Use a regular expression to find users:

describe users.where { uid =~ /S\-1\-5\-21\-\d+\-\d+\-\d+\-500/ } do
  it { should exist }
end

Test that only allowed users exist:

allowed_users = %w(user1 user2 user3)

users.where { uid > 1000 && uid < 65534 }.usernames.sort.each do |u|
  describe user(u) do
    if allowed_users.include?(u)
      it { should exist }
    else
      it { should_not exist }
    end
  end
end

Matchers

For a full list of available matchers, see our Universal Matchers page.

This resource has the following special matchers.

exist

The exist matcher tests if the named user exists:

it { should exist }