Man Pages (1M): Maintenance and Administration Commands

nscd(1M)

NAME

nscd- Name service cache daemon

SYNOPSIS

/usr/sbin/nscd

-f

configuration-file

-g

-e

cachename

-i

cachename

DESCRIPTION

nscd is a process that provides a cache for the most common name service requests. It is started up during multi-user boot. The default configuration-file /etc/nscd.conf determines the behavior of the cache daemon. See nscd.conf(4).

nscd provides cacheing for the passwd(4), group(4) and hosts(4) databases through standard libc interfaces, such as gethostbyname(3N), gethostbyaddr(3N), and others. Each cache has a separate time-to-live for its data; modifying the local database (/etc/hosts, and so forth) causes that cache to become invalidated within ten seconds. Note that the shadow file is specifically not cached. getspnam(3C) calls remain uncached as a result.

nscd also acts as its own administration tool. If an instance of nscd is already running, commands are passed to the running version transparently.

In order to preserve NIS+ security, the startup script for nscd (/etc/init.d/nscd) checks the permissions on the passwd, group and host tables if NIS+ is being used. If those tables are not readable by unauthenticated users, then caching is disabled so that each process continues to authenticate itself as before.

nscd runs at the sensitivity label ADMIN_LOW. However, it can communicate with DNS name servers at any sensitivity label. It requires the Trusted Path attribute.

OPTIONS

Several of the options described below require a cachename specification. Supported values are passwd, group, and hosts.

-f configuration-file: Causes nscd to read its configuration data from the specified file.
-g: Prints current configuration and statistics to standard output. This is the only option executable by non-root users.
-e cachename, yes|no: Enables or disables the specified cache.
-i cachename: Invalidate the specified cache.

EXAMPLES

Example 1 Stopping and restarting the `nscd` daemon.

	example# /etc/init.d/nscd stop
	example# /etc/init.d/nscd start

SUMMARY OF TRUSTED SOLARIS CHANGES

To invoke nscd requires the Trusted Path attribute, a process sensitivity label of ADMIN_LOW, and the following privileges: net_upgrade_sl, net_mac_read, proc_setclr, sys_trans_label, sys_net_config, file_dac_write, and file_setid. If nscd's clearance is not ADMIN_HIGH, it will be set to ADMIN_HIGH.

FILES

/etc/nscd.conf determines behavior of cache daemon.

ATTRIBUTES

See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:

ATTRIBUTE TYPE	ATTRIBUTE VALUE
Availability	SUNWcsu

Trusted Solaris 7 Reference Manual

nsswitch.conf(4)

SunOS 5.7 Reference Manual

gethostbyname(3N), group(4), hosts(4), nscd.conf(4), passwd(4), attributes(5)

WARNINGS

The nscd interface is included in this release on an uncommitted basis only, and is subject to change or removal in a future minor release.

Trusted Solaris 7 Last Revised 17 Jul 1997