HP-UX Reference (11i v3 07/02) - 1M System Administration Commands N-Z (vol 4)

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ypserv(1M) ypserv(1M)
NAME
ypserv, ypbind, ypxfrd - Network Information Service (NIS) server, binder, and transfer processes
SYNOPSIS
/usr/lib/netsvc/yp/ypserv
[-l log_file][-dv]
/usr/lib/netsvc/yp/ypbind
[-l log_file][-s][-ypset-ypsetme][
-broadcast ]
/usr/sbin/ypxfrd
Remarks
The Network Information Service (NIS) was formerly known as Yellow Pages (YP). The functionality
remains the same; only the name has changed.
DESCRIPTION
The Network Information Service (NIS) provides a simple network lookup service consisting of databases
and processes. The databases are ndbm files in a directory tree rooted at
/var/yp (see ndbm(3X)). These
files are described in ypfiles(4). The processes are
/usr/lib/netsvc/yp/ypserv
, the NIS database
lookup server, and
/usr/lib/netsvc/yp/ypbind
, the NIS binder. Both ypserv and ypbind are
daemon processes activated at system startup time when the
NIS_MASTER_SERVER
or
NIS_SLAVE_SERVER
variable is set to 1, for ypserv, and the NIS_CLIENT variable is set to 1, for
ypbind, in the /etc/rc.config.d/namesvrs
file.
The NIS programmatic interface is described in ypclnt(3C). Administrative tools are described in
ypwhich(1), yppoll(1M), yppush(1M), ypset(1M) and ypxfr(1M). Tools to see the contents of NIS maps
(databases) are described in ypcat(1) and ypmatch(1). Database generation and maintenance tools are
described in makedbm(1M), ypinit(1M), and ypmake(1M). The command to set or show the default NIS
domain is
domainname .
ypxfrd transfers entire NIS maps in an efficient manner. For systems that use this daemon, map
transfers will be faster, depending on the map. ypxfrd should be run on the master server. ypxfr
(see
ypxfr(1M)) will attempt to use
ypxfrd first. If that fails, it will use the older transfer method. The
ypxfrd daemon is activated at system startup time when the NIS_MASTER_SERVER
or
NIS_SLAVE_SERVER
variable is set to 1 in the /etc/rc.config.d/namesvrs file.
The
ypserv daemon’s primary function is to look up information in its local database of NIS maps. It
runs only on NIS server machines providing data from NIS databases.
The operations performed by ypserv are defined for the implementor by the YP Protocol Specification,
and for the programmer by the header file <rpcsvc/yp_prot.h
>. Communication to and from
ypserv is by means of RPC. Lookup functions are described in ypclnt(3C) and are supplied as C-callable
functions in the TI-RPC library (-lnsl).
Four functions namely: yp_match() , yp_first() , yp_next(), and yp_all() perform a lookup
on a specific map within a NIS domain. The
yp_match() operation matches a key to a record in the
database and returns its associated value. The yp_first() operation returns the first key-value pair
(record) from the map, and yp_next() can be used to enumerate (sequentially retrieve) the remainder of
the records. yp_all() returns all records in the map to the requester as the response to a single RPC
request.
A number of special keys in the DBM files can alter the way in which ypserv operates. The keys of interest
are:
YP_INTERDOMAIN
The presence of this key makes ypserv forward host lookups that cannot be satisfied by the
DBM files to a DNS server.
YP_SECURE
This key makes ypserv answer only questions coming from clients on reserved ports.
YP_MULTI_hostname
This is a special key in the form "YP_MULTI_hostname addr1, ..., addrN". A client looking for
hostname receives the closest address.
Two functions supply information about the map itself and not the map entries. These functions are
yp_order() and yp_master() . The order number is the time of last modification of a map. The mas-
ter name is the host name of the machine on which the master map is stored. Both order number and mas-
ter name exist in the map as special key-value pairs, but the server does not return these through the
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