Macintosh Terminal Pocket Guide

Name

finger — stdin  stdout  - file  -- opt  --help  --version

Synopsis

finger [options] [user[@host]]

The finger command prints information about logged-in users in a short form:

➜ finger
Login     Name            TTY   Idle  Login   Time   Phone
smith     Sandy Smith     *con        Sep 6   17:09
barrett   Daniel Barrett  s00     24  Sep 6   17:10
jones     Jill Jones      s01         Thu     20:58

or a long form:

➜ finger smith
Login: smith                       Name: Sandy Smith
Directory: /Users/smith            Shell: /bin/bash
On since Sat Sep  6 17:09 (EDT) on console
No Mail.
Project: Enhance world peace
Plan: Mistrust first impulses; they are always right.

The user argument can be a local username or a remote user in the form user@host. However, most computers no longer allow finger connections from the outside world due to security concerns.

Useful options

-l	Print in long format.
-s	Print in short format.
-p	Don’t display the Project and Plan sections, which are ordinarily read from the user’s ~/.project and ~/.plan files, respectively.