Modules/spwdmodule.c

Source:

cpython 3.14 @ ab2d84fe1023/Modules/spwdmodule.c ↗

spwd wraps getspnam(3) and getspent(3) to access the shadow password database (/etc/shadow). Requires root or shadow group membership. Deprecated in Python 3.11 and removed in 3.13.

Map

Lines	Symbol	Role
1-60	struct_spwd	structseq with sp_namp, sp_pwdp, sp_lstchg, etc.
61-140	spwd_getspnam_impl	Look up by username: getspnam(name)
141-200	spwd_getspall_impl	Return all shadow entries as a list
201-250	mkspent	Convert struct spwd * to Python struct_spwd

Reading

struct_spwd fields

// CPython: Modules/spwdmodule.c:42 struct_spwd_fields
/* sp_namp    — login name */
/* sp_pwdp    — encrypted password (hash + salt) */
/* sp_lstchg  — days since Jan 1 1970 of last change */
/* sp_min     — minimum days before change allowed */
/* sp_max     — maximum days before change required */
/* sp_warn    — days before expiry to warn user */
/* sp_inact   — days after expiry until account disabled */
/* sp_expire  — days since epoch when account expires */
/* sp_flag    — reserved */

spwd_getspnam_impl

// CPython: Modules/spwdmodule.c:98 spwd_getspnam_impl
static PyObject *
spwd_getspnam_impl(PyObject *module, PyObject *arg)
{
    const char *name = PyUnicode_AsUTF8(arg);
    struct spwd *p;
    if ((p = getspnam(name)) == NULL) {
        if (errno != 0)
            return PyErr_SetFromErrno(PyExc_OSError);
        PyErr_SetString(PyExc_KeyError, "getspnam(): name not found");
        return NULL;
    }
    return mkspent(p);
}

spwd_getspall_impl

// CPython: Modules/spwdmodule.c:150 spwd_getspall_impl
static PyObject *
spwd_getspall_impl(PyObject *module)
{
    PyObject *d = PyList_New(0);
    setspent();
    struct spwd *p;
    while ((p = getspent()) != NULL) {
        PyObject *v = mkspent(p);
        if (v == NULL || PyList_Append(d, v) != 0) {
            Py_XDECREF(v);
            Py_DECREF(d);
            endspent();
            return NULL;
        }
        Py_DECREF(v);
    }
    endspent();
    return d;
}

gopy notes

spwd was removed in Python 3.13 and is not in gopy's stdlib. The annotation documents the module for completeness. Shadow password access in modern Python is typically done via PAM (python-pam) or by reading /etc/shadow directly with elevated privileges.