What is a 'system account file'?

[Detlef Lechner]

Hello Avi,

On Thu, 2010-02-11 at 12:23 +0000, Avi Greenbury wrote:
> Detlef Lechner wrote:

> > man usermod: "DESCRIPTION: The usermod command modifies the system
> > account files to reflect the changes that are specified on the command
> > line." 
> ... 
> > What is a 'system account file'?
> 
> There's three, as pertaining to users, generally:
> 
> /etc/passwd	user configuration
> /etc/groups	group configuration
> /etc/shadow	user passwords
> /etc/gshadow	secure group configuration
> 
> There's more info here:
> http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/linux/RHL-8.0-Manual/admin-primer/s1-acctsgrps-files.html

I believe that your answer only partially meets my question. For
example,
why does Ubuntu consider it necessary to create a user account named
kernoops (which it does in /etc/passwd)?

Regards,
Detlef
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