Here is a script that will do it for you .....
You can add a list of users (or just one user) if you want, all in one go and each will have a different password. As a bonus you are presented at the end of the script with a list of each users password. .... If you want you can add some user maintenance options
like:
chage -m 18 $user
chage -M 28 $user
to the script that will set the password age and so on.
=======
#!/bin/bash
# Checks if you have the right privileges
if [ "$USER" = "root" ]
then
# CHANGE THIS PARAMETERS FOR A PARTICULAR USE
PERS_HOME="/home/"
PERS_SH="/bin/bash"
# Checks if there is an argument
[ $# -eq 0 ] && { echo >&2 ERROR: You may enter as an argument a text file containing users, one per line. ; exit 1; }
# checks if there a regular file
[ -f "$1" ] || { echo >&2 ERROR: The input file does not exists. ; exit 1; }
TMPIN=$(mktemp)
# Remove blank lines and delete duplicates
sed '/^$/d' "$1"| sort -g | uniq > "$TMPIN"
NOW=$(date +"%Y-%m-%d-%X")
LOGFILE="AMU-log-$NOW.log"
for user in $(more "$TMPIN"); do
# Checks if the user already exists.
cut -d: -f1 /etc/passwd | grep "$user" > /dev/null
OUT=$?
if [ $OUT -eq 0 ];then
echo >&2 "ERROR: User account: \"$user\" already exists."
echo >&2 "ERROR: User account: \"$user\" already exists." >> "$LOGFILE"
else
# Create a new user
/usr/sbin/useradd -d "$PERS_HOME""$user" -s "$PERS_SH" -m "$user"
# passwdgen must be installed
pass=$(passwdgen -paq --length 8)
echo $pass | passwd --stdin $user
# save user and password in a file
echo -e $user"\t"$pass >> "$LOGFILE"
echo "The user \"$user\" has been created and has the password: $pass"
fi
done
rm -f "$TMPIN"
exit 0
else
echo >&2 "ERROR: You must be a root user to execute this script."
exit 1
fi
===========
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Carel