Mastering Linux Shell Scripting - Second Edition

The lastlog command

If we look at the output from lastlog, when it is used without any options, we can begin to understand the issue. From the command line, we execute the command as a standard user. There is no requirement to run it as the root account. The command is shown in the following example:

$ lastlog 

The partial output is shown within the following screenshot:

We can see, even from this limited output, that we have a cluttered output due to the virtual noise being created by the accounts that have not logged in. It is possible to alleviate this to some degree using the lastlog options but it may not entirely resolve the issue. To ...