Solaris Naming Administration Guide

Storing and Updating Credential Information

Credential-related information, such as public keys, is stored in many locations throughout the namespace. NIS+ updates this information periodically, depending on the time-to-live values of the objects that store it, but sometimes, between updates, it gets out of sync. As a result, you may find that operations that should work, don't work. Table A-2 lists all the objects, tables, and files that store credential-related information and how to reset it.

Table A-2 Where Credential-Related Information is Stored

Item 

Stores 

To Reset or Change 

cred table 

NIS+ principal's secret key and public key. These are the master copies of these keys. 

Use nisaddcred to create new credentials; it updates existing credentials. An alternative is chkey.

Directory object 

A copy of the public key of each server that supports it. 

Run the /usr/lib/nis/

nisupdkeys command on the directory object.

Keyserver 

The secret key of the NIS+ principal that is currently logged in. 

Run keylogin for a principal user or keylogin -r for a principal workstation.

NIS+ daemon 

Copies of directory objects, which in turn contain copies of their servers' public keys. 

Kill the daemon and the cache manager. Then restart both. 

Directory cache 

A copy of directory objects, which in turn contain copies of their servers' public keys. 

Kill the NIS+ cache manager and restart it with the nis_cachemgr -i command. The -i option resets the directory cache from the cold-start file and restarts the cache manager.

Cold-start file 

A copy of a directory object, which in turn contains copies of its servers' public keys. 

On the root master, kill the NIS+ daemon and restart it. The daemon reloads new information into the existing NIS_COLD_START file.

For a client, first remove the cold-start and shared directory files from /var/nis, and kill the cache manager. Then re-initialize the principal with nisinit -c. The principal's trusted server reloads new information into the principal's existing cold-start file.

passwd table 

A user's password or a workstation's superuser password. 

Use the passwd -r nisplus command. It changes the password in the NIS+ passwd table and updates it in the cred table.

passwd file

A user's password or a workstation's superuser password. 

Use the passwd -r nisplus command, whether logged in as superuser or as yourself, whichever is appropriate.

passwd map

(NIS) 

A user's password or a workstation's superuser password. 

Use passwd -r nisplus.