PAM_AUTHENTICATE(3)
NAME
pam_authenticate - account authentication
SYNOPSIS
#include <security/pam_appl.h> int pam_authenticate(pam_handle_t *pamh, int flags);
DESCRIPTION
The pam_authenticate function is used to authenticate the user. The
user is required to provide an authentication token depending upon the
authentication service, usually this is a password, but could also be a
finger print.
The PAM service module may request that the user enter their username
vio the the conversation mechanism (see pam_start(3) and pam_conv(3)).
The name of the authenticated user will be present in the PAM item
PAM_USER. This item may be recovered with a call to pam_get_item(3).
The pamh argument is an authentication handle obtained by a prior call
to pam_start(). The flags argument is the binary or of zero or more of
the following values:
- PAM_SILENT
- Do not emit any messages.
- PAM_DISALLOW_NULL_AUTHTOK
- The PAM module service should return PAM_AUTH_ERR if the user does not have a registered authentication token.
RETURN VALUES
- PAM_ABORT
- The application should exit immediately after calling pam_end(3) first.
- PAM_AUTH_ERR
- The user was not authenticated.
- PAM_CRED_INSUFFICIENT
- For some reason the application does not have sufficient
credentials to authenticate the user. - PAM_AUTHINFO_UNVAIL
- The modules were not able to access the authentication information. This might be due to a network or hardware failure etc.
- PAM_MAXTRIES
- One or more of the authentication modules has reached its limit of tries authenticating the user. Do not try again.
- PAM_SUCCESS
- The user was successfully authenticated.
- PAM_USER_UNKNOWN
- User unknown to authentication service.