What is chsh command use for?

Question

I know that chsh is use to change the login shell with the shell listed in this file. Okay,

But what is actually Login shell is? Can anyone tell me this as simple as you can? ;)

This is pretty good 'one-stop shop' summary from @Gilles. – bu5hman Dec 12 '17 at 14:20 — bu5hman, Dec 12 '17 at 14:20

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 12 '17 at 09:20

It's the shell you are running when you login.
E.g. when I ssh into my remote servers, I like to have bash:

chsh       [ENTER]
/bin/bash  [ENTER]

You might want to read more on this topic:

A login shell is the first process that executes under your user ID when you log in for an interactive session.

dr_ · Answer 2 · 2023-07-14T09:35:07.307

2

The login shell, as the name says, is the shell (bash, zsh, etc) that is given to an user when they log in and where they type commands.

It's stored as the last field in /etc/passwd:

jdoe:x:1031:1031:John Doe:/home/jdoe:/bin/bash

edited Jul 14 '23 at 09:35

answered Dec 12 '17 at 09:21

dr_

“It's stored as the last field in /etc/passwd” ... on systems which use /etc/passwd to define their users. – Stephen Kitt Dec 12 '17 at 09:37

2 Answers2