nis_cachemgr Daemon

The nis_cachemgr should run on all NIS+ clients. The cache manager maintains a cache of location information about the NIS+ servers that support the most frequently used directories in the namespace, including transport addresses, authentication information, and a time-to-live value.

At startup, the cache manager obtains its initial information from the client's cold-start file, and downloads it into the /var/nis/NIS_SHARED_DIRCACHE file.

The cache manager makes requests as a client machine. Make sure the client machine has the proper credentials, or instead of improving performance, the cache manager will degrade it.

Starting and Stopping the NIS+ Cache Manager

When using the Service Management Facility (SMF), the cache manager has a dependency on the NIS+ service, so cache manager starts and stops along with the NIS+ service. Use the svcadm command to start, stop, or restart the NIS+ service.

client% svcadm enable /network/rpc/nisplus:default
client% svcadm disable /network/rpc/nisplus:default
client% svcadm restart /network/rpc/nisplus:default

When you stop and start the NIS+ service, the cache manager is restarted but it retains the information in the /var/nis/NIS_SHARED_DIRCACHE file. The information in the cold-start file is simply appended to the existing information in the cache file. Use the -i option to clear the cache file and re-initialize it from the contents of the client's cold-start file.