Remove Linux User From a Secondary Group ( Supplementary Groups )
Q. User tom is a member of a group called sales and printer. I'd like to remove tom from a group called printer without editing any user configuration text files stored at /etc/ directory?
A. /etc/groups file defines group membership for each user. usermod command has -G option to set a list of supplementary groups which the user is also a member of. Each group is separated from the next by a comma, with no intervening whitespace. If the user is currently a member of a group which is not listed, the user will be removed from the group.
Step # 1: Find out user group identity
Use id command:
# id -nG {user-name}
# id -nG tom
Output:
sales printer
Step # 2: Remove user from printer group
Use the following syntax:
# usermod -G {groupname1,groupname2,...} {username}
To keep membership for sales only group (remove user tom from printer group), enter:
# usermod -G sales tom
# id -nG tom
Output:
sales
The following example remove user vivek from all groups except admin, audio, video and powerdev group:
# id -nG vivek
Output:
vivek adm dialout cdrom floppy audio dip video plugdev scanner netdev lpadmin powerdev admin
Modify group membership, enter:
# usermod -G admin, audio, video, powerdev vivek
# id -nG tom
Sample output:
vivek audio video powerdev admin
For more information, read usermod(8) command man page:
$ man usermod
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Tags: delete group membership, group id, group identity, group membership, id command, linux delete user from group, user group, usermod command ~ Last updated on: March 3, 2008
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