# Manual Page: dbmmanage

    NAME
         dbmmanage - Create and update user authentication  files  in
         DBM format

    SYNOPSIS
         dbmmanage filename [ command ] [ username [ encpasswd ] ]

    DESCRIPTION
         dbmmanage is used to create and update the DBM format  files
         used  to  store usernames and password for basic authentica-
         tion of HTTP users.   Resources  available  from  the  httpd
         Apache web server can be restricted to just the users listed
         in the files created by dbmmanage. This program can only  be
         used  when  the usernames are stored in a DBM file. To use a
         flat-file database see htpasswd.

         This manual page only lists the command line arguments.  For
         details  of  the  directives  necessary  to  configure  user
         authentication in httpd see the Apache manual, which is part
         of   the   Apache   distribution   or   can   be   found  at
         http://www.apache.org/.

    OPTIONS
         filename
              The filename of the DBM format  file.  Usually  without
              the extension .db, .pag, or .dir.

         command
              This selects the operation to perform:

         add         Adds an entry for username to filename using the
                     encrypted password encpassword.

         adduser     Asks for a password and then adds an  entry  for
                     username to filename .

         check       Asks for a password and then checks if  username
                     is  in filename and if it's password matches the
                     specified one.

         delete      Deletes the username entry from filename.

         import      Reads username:password entries (one  per  line)
                     from  STDIN and adds them to filename. The pass-
                     words already has to be crypted.

         update      Same as the "adduser" command,  except  that  it
                     makes sure username already exists in filename.

         view        Just displays the complete contents of  the  DBM
                     file.

         username    The user for which the update operation is  per-
                     formed.

    BUGS
         One should be aware that there are a number of different DBM
         file   formats   in  existence,  and  with  all  likelihood,
         libraries for more than one format may exist on your system.
         The three primary examples are NDBM, the GNU project's GDBM,
         and Berkeley DB 2.  Unfortunately, all these  libraries  use
         different file formats, and you must make sure that the file
         format used by filename is the same  format  that  dbmmanage
         expects  to see. dbmmanage currently has no way of determin-
         ing what type of DBM file it is looking at.  If used against
         the  wrong format, will simply return nothing, or may create
         a different DBM file with a different name, or at worst,  it
         may  corrupt the DBM file if you were attempting to write to
         it.

         dbmmanage has a list of DBM format preferences,  defined  by
         the  @AnyDBM::ISA  array  near the beginning of the program.
         Since we prefer the Berkeley DB 2 file format, the order  in
         which  dbmmanage  will look for system libraries is Berkeley
         DB 2, then NDBM, and then GDBM.   The  first  library  found
         will  be  the  library dbmmanage will attempt to use for all
         DBM file transactions.  This ordering is slightly  different
         than  the standard @AnyDBM::ISA ordering in perl, as well as
         the ordering used by the simple dbmopen() call in  Perl,  so
         if  you  use  any  other utilities to manage your DBM files,
         they must also follow  this  preference  ordering.   Similar
         care  must  be  taken  if using programs in other languages,
         like C, to access these files.

         Apache's mod_auth_dbm.c  corresponds  to  the  NDBM
         library.  Also, one can usually use the  file  program  sup-
         plied  with  most Unix systems to see what format a DBM file
         is in.

    SEE ALSO
         httpd(8)