Username

Information about Username

"Username" redirects here. For the same term in Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:Username

User in a computing context refers to one who uses a computer system. Users may need to identify themselves for the purposes of accounting, security, logging and resource management. In order to identify oneself, a user has an account (a user account) and a username (also called a screen name, handle, nickname, or nick on some systems), and in most cases also a password (see below). Users employ the user interface to access systems, and the process of identification is often referred to as authentication.

Users are also widely characterized as the class of people that uses a system without complete technical expertise required to fully understand the system. In most hacker-related contexts, they are also called real users. See also End-user (computer science).

A computer user is similar to the user in telecommunications, but with slight semantic differences. The difference is comparable to the difference between end-users and consumers in economics.

For instance, one can be a user of (and have an account on) a computer system, a computer network or have an e-mail account.

Semantics

A user account allows one to authenticate to system services. It also generally provides one with the opportunity to be authorized to access them. However, authentication does not automatically imply authorization. Once the user has logged on, the operating system will often use an identifier such as an integer to refer to them, rather than their username. On Unix systems this is called the user identifier or user id.

Computer systems are divided into two groups based on what kind of users they have:

single-user systems do not have a concept of several user accounts
multi-user systems have such a concept, and require users to identify themselves before using the system.

Compare

Luser
End-user (computer science)
Stakeholder: a user is an operational stakeholder; many other stakeholders are not involved in operations
Registered user
Superuser

References

This article was originally based on material from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, which is licensed under the GFDL.

computing is synonymous with counting and calculating. Originally, people that performed these functions were known as computers. Today it refers to a science and technology that deals with the computation and the manipulation of symbols.
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A password is a form of secret authentication data that is used to control access to a resource. The password is kept secret from those not allowed access, and those wishing to gain access are tested on whether or not they know the password and are granted or denied access
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The user interface (or Human Machine Interface) is the aggregate of means by which people (the users) interact with a particular machine, device, computer program or other complex tool (the system).
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Hacker has several common meanings, the unifying characteristic of which is only that it refers to a person who is an avid computer enthusiast. It is most commonly used as a pejorative by the mass media to refer to a person who engages in illegal computer cracking, which is its
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The end-user is a popular concept in software engineering, referring to an abstraction of the group of persons who will ultimately operate a piece of software (i.e. the expected user or target-user).
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In telecommunications, a user is a person, organization, or other entity that employs the services provided by a telecommunication system, or by an information processing system, for transfer of information.
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end-user as the person who uses a product. The end-user or consumer may differ from the customer, who might buy the product, but doesn't necessarily use it; for example, a zookeeper, the customer, might purchase elephant food for an end-user: the elephant.
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computer is a machine which manipulates data according to a list of instructions.

Computers take numerous physical forms. The first devices that resemble modern computers date to the mid-20th century (around 1940 - 1941), although the computer concept and various machines
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as a college campus, industrial complex, or a military base. A CAN, may be considered a type of MAN (metropolitan area network), but is generally limited to an area that is smaller than a typical MAN.
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E-mail (short for electronic mail; often also abbreviated as e-mail, email or simply mail) is a store and forward method of composing, sending, storing, and receiving messages over electronic communication systems.
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Authentication (from Greek αυθεντικός; real or genuine, from authentes; author) is the act of establishing or confirming something (or someone) as authentic, that is, that claims made by or about the thing are true.
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authorization is a part of the operating system that protects computer resources by only allowing those resources to be used by resource consumers that have been granted authority to use them.
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Unix (officially trademarked as UNIX®) is a computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie and Douglas McIlroy.
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On Unix-like systems, users are represented by a user identifier, often abbreviated UID. The range of values for a UID varies amongst different systems; at the very least, a UID can be between 0 and 32767, with some restrictions:

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Multi-user is a term that defines an operating system or application software that allows concurrent access by multiple users of a computer. Time-sharing systems are multi-user systems.
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luser (sometimes expanded to local user; also luzer or luzzer) is a painfully annoying, stupid, or irritating computer user.^[1] It is a portmanteau of "loser" and "user" and is usually pronounced as "loser".
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Stakeholder may refer to:

Stakeholder (corporate), a party who affects, or can be affected by, the company's actions
Stakeholder theory, identifies and models the groups which are stakeholders of a corporation

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A registered user is one who uses a program or a website and provides his credentials, effectively proving his identity.

Technical differences

Generally speaking, any person can become a registered user by providing some credentials, usually in the form of a username (or
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On many computer operating systems, superuser, or root, is the term used for the special user account that is controlled by the system administrator.

Many older operating systems on computers intended for personal and home use, including MS-DOS and Windows 9x, are not
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GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL or simply GFDL) is a copyleft license for free documentation, designed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for the GNU project.
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