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Developer(s) | Bill Joy, Richard Mlynarik, Intel, Microsoft, ReactOS Contributors, Novell |
---|---|
Operating system | Unix, Unix-like, iRMX 86, Windows, ReactOS, NetWare |
Platform | Cross-platform |
Type | Command |
License | BSD: BSD License coreutils: GPLv3 iRMX 86, Windows, NetWare: Proprietary commercial software ReactOS: GPLv2 |
In computing, whoami is a command found on most Unix-like operating systems, Intel iRMX 86, every Microsoft Windows[1] operating system since Windows Server 2003, and on ReactOS. It is a concatenation of the words "Who am I?" and prints the effective username of the current user when invoked.
The command has the same effect as the Unix command id -un. On Unix-like operating systems, the output of the command is slightly different from $USER because whoami outputs the username that the user is working under, whereas $USER outputs the username that was used to log in. For example, if the user logged in as John and su into root, whoami displays root and echo $USER displays John. This is because the su command does not invoke a login shell by default.
The earliest versions were created in 2.9 BSD as a convenience form for who am i, the Berkeley Unix who command's way of printing just the logged in user's identity. This version was developed by Bill Joy.[2]
The GNU version was written by Richard Mlynarik and is part of the GNU Core Utilities (coreutils).
The command is available as a separate package for Microsoft Windows as part of the GnuWin32 project[3] and the UnxUtils collection of native Win32 ports of common GNU Unix-like utilities.[4]
On Intel iRMX 86 this command lists the currents user's identification and access rights.[5]
The command is also available as part of the Windows 2000 Resource Kit[6] and Windows XP SP2 Support Tools.[7]
The ReactOS version was developed by Ismael Ferreras Morezuelas and is licensed under the GPLv2.[8]
This command was also available as a NetWare-Command residing in the public-directory of the fileserver. It also outputs the current connections to which server the workstation is attached with which username.
# whoami
root
--WHOAMI
USER ID: 5
ACCESS ID'S: 5, WORLD
C:\Users\admin>whoami
workgroup\admin