/etc/group Question
 

Hi,
I've been unable to find a reference to this in the Slack book.

/etc/group
plugdev : x : 83 : pappy <--- What dose the "x" mean?

I'm new to slack and know very little, and I'm having a problem that I prefer to work out for myself. But I just can't seem to clear up this little "x" thing.

Have a look at the manpage

http://www.hmug.org/man/5/group.php

Like in "passwd" file, the 'x' field is the password field. It says 'x' because the file needs to be readable by non-root users too, and giving out (encrypted or not) passwords is a security risk, so usually there are no passwords in the field. The case is somewhat same with 'passwd'; the passwords are nowadays saved in 'shadow' file instead of 'passwd', and 'passwd' merely states 'x' in the password field to tell that the actual password is in 'shadow'.

Thanks b0uncer!!