Specifications

The ULTRIX Operating System, Version 4.5 SPD 26.40.32
and other suppliers of intelligent peripheral are able to
more easily write the necessary drivers and support
code for other third party devices.
OPEN SCSI CAM is not available on VAX ULTRIX sys-
tems. ULTRIX RISC does not support the use of SCSI
devices on DECsystem 5800 systems.
System Administration Enhancements
• Graphical User Account Manager
• Integral bad block replacement for DSA/MSCP and
SCSI disks
• System diagnostics
• Error logging
• Streaming tape
• Remote backup
• Gateway Screen Facility
• Network installation for MicroVAX, VAXstation, and
RISC-based systems
• Magnetic tape facilities including labeled tape facil-
ity for single-volume ANSI tape interchange between
ULTRIX and non-ULTRIX systems
• Line printer setup automation
• Documented error messages
• Support for up to 256 simultaneous users, available
through the use of user capacity upgrades
• Support for more than 64 file descriptors
Security Enhancements
The ULTRIX Operating System offers security features
designed to be compliant with the C2 security level as
specified by the
Trusted Computing Security Evaluation
Criteria
(Orange Book) and the Password Management
Guidelines
(Green Book).
• Protection of the memory interface and terminals via
pre-assigned group identifiers.
• Trusted Path facility which allows users, logging into
a system via either LAT or a terminal multiplexer, to
ensure that no other process is running on that line.
• Administrator option to configure enhanced login and
password functionality, which includes a shadow au-
thentication database, configurable minimum pass-
word length (up to 16 characters), password aging
and expiration.
• Security auditing subsystem and audit trail reduc-
tion facility which tracks and records all the security
relevant actions occurring on the system along with
who performed the action. This includes an audstyle
(audit) option to control how much information is in-
cluded in audit records for execv (2) and execve (2)
events.
• Gateway packet screening. An ULTRIX system may
be used as a gateway (packet router) to connect sev-
eral IP networks. The Gateway packet screening
facility allows the system manager to control which
packets are forwarded, as one part of a comprehen-
sive network security policy. The facility consists of a
kernel-resident mechanism and a user-level daemon,
/usr/etc/screend. When a packet is ready to be for-
warded, the kernel mechanism submits the packet’s
headers to the daemon. The screend daemon ex-
amines the headers and tells the kernel to forward
or reject the packet, based on a set of rules defined
in the configuration file, /etc/screend.conf. Option-
ally, some or all decisions can be logged allowing a
manager to detect improper configurations or poten-
tial security problems.
For reasonable security and performance using screend,
Gateway packet screening should be used on a system
dedicated only to packet routing and related support ac-
tivities.
• Kerberos Authentication. Kerberos is a third-party
authentication service. The authentication of an ap-
plication X to another application Y depends upon
the trust both X and Y have in Kerberos. The BIND
/HESIOD daemon named has been enhanced to op-
tionally use Kerberos. ULTRIX also provides the Ker-
beros V4 programming interface so that application
developers can use this service. ULTRIX does not
provide the routines to send encrypted (safe) mes-
sages.
• Data Encryption/Decryption Facilities. The object
code distribution for the ULTRIX Operating System
includes no forms of encryption or decryption other
than one-way password encryption and Kerberos en-
cryption algorithm. Data encryption/decryption soft-
ware is available as an option under a separate order
number. Refer to the
SOFTWARE OPTIONS section
for ordering information.
ULTRIX includes a set of intersystem facilities for com-
munication and networking of multiple systems.
•
Asynchronous Lines
Dynamic reassignment of asynchronous lines allows
use of the same modems for dialing in and out of a sys-
tem without user intervention. Terminal drivers support
7-bit and 8-bit characters.
•
Synchronous Lines
2