Delete a user security group.
Syntax groupdel group
groupdel modifies the system account files, deleting all entries that refer to group. The named group must exist.
Caveats
You can not remove the primary group of any existing user.
You must remove the user before you remove the group.
You should manually check all file systems to ensure that no files remain owned by this group.
Configuration
The following configuration variables in /etc/login.defs change the behavior of this tool:
MAX_MEMBERS_PER_GROUP (number)
Maximum members per group entry. When the maximum is reached, a new group entry (line) is started in /etc/group (with the same name, same password, and same GID).
The default value is 0, meaning that there are no limits in the number of members in a group.
This feature (split group) permits to limit the length of lines in the group file. This is useful to make sure that lines for NIS groups are not larger than 1024 characters.
If you need to enforce such limit, you can use 25.
Note: split groups might not be supported by all tools (even in the Shadow toolsuite). You should not use this variable unless you really need it.
Files
/etc/group Group account information.
/etc/gshadow Secure group account information.
Exit Values
The groupdel command exits with the following values:
0 success 2 invalid command syntax 3 invalid argument to option 6 specified group doesn't exist 8 can't remove user's primary group 10 can't update group file
Related linux commands:
groupadd – Add a group
groupmod – Modify a group
userdel – Delete a user account
Equivalent Windows command: dsrm – Remove active directory object.