xref: /freebsd/usr.sbin/mountd/netgroup.5 (revision 8e6b01171e30297084bb0b4457c4183c2746aacc)
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32.\"     @(#)netgroup.5	8.2 (Berkeley) 12/11/93
33.\"
34.Dd December 11, 1993
35.Dt NETGROUP 5
36.Os
37.Sh NAME
38.Nm netgroup
39.Nd defines network groups
40.Sh SYNOPSIS
41.Nm netgroup
42.Sh DESCRIPTION
43The
44.Nm netgroup
45file
46specifies ``netgroups'', which are sets of
47.Sy (host, user, domain)
48tuples that are to be given similar network access.
49.Pp
50Each line in the file
51consists of a netgroup name followed by a list of the members of the
52netgroup.
53Each member can be either the name of another netgroup or a specification
54of a tuple as follows:
55.Bd -literal -offset indent
56(host, user, domain)
57.Ed
58where the
59.Sy host ,
60.Sy user ,
61and
62.Sy domain
63are character string names for the corresponding component.
64Any of the comma separated fields may be empty to specify a ``wildcard'' value
65or may consist of the string ``-'' to specify ``no valid value''.
66The members of the list may be separated by whitespace and/or commas;
67the ``\e'' character may be used at the end of a line to specify
68line continuation.
69The functions specified in
70.Xr getnetgrent 3
71should normally be used to access the
72.Nm netgroup
73database.
74.Pp
75Lines that begin with a # are treated as comments.
76.Sh NIS/YP INTERACTION
77On most other platforms,
78.Nm netgroups
79are only used in conjunction with
80NIS and local
81.Pa /etc/netgroup
82files are ignored. With FreeBSD,
83.Nm netgroups
84can be used with either NIS or local files, but there are certain
85caveats to consider. The existing
86.Nm netgroup
87system is extremely inefficient where
88.Fn innetgr 3
89lookups are concerned since
90.Nm netgroup
91memberships are computed on the fly. By contrast, the NIS
92.Nm netgroup
93database consists of three seperate maps (netgroup, netgroup.byuser
94and netgroup.byhost) that are keyed to allow
95.Fn innetgr 3
96lookups to be done quickly. The FreeBSD
97.Nm netgroup
98system can interact with the NIS
99.Nm netgroup
100maps in the following ways:
101.Bl -bullet -offset indent
102.It
103If the
104.Pa /etc/netgroup
105file does not exist, or it exists and is empty, or
106it exists and contains only a '+', and NIS is running,
107.Nm netgroup
108lookups will be done exclusively through NIS, with
109.Fn innetgr 3
110taking advantage of the netgroup.byuser and
111netgroup.byhost maps to speed up searches. (This
112is more or less compatible with the behavior of SunOS and
113similar platforms.)
114.It
115If the
116.Pa /etc/netgroup
117exists and contains only local
118.Nm netgroup
119information (with no NIS '+' token), then only the local
120.Nm netgroup
121information will be processed (and NIS will be ingored).
122.It
123If
124.Pa /etc/netgroup
125exists and contains both local netgroup data
126.Pa and
127the NIS '+' token, the local data and the NIS netgroup
128map will be processed as a single combined
129.Nm netgroup
130database. While this configuration is the most flexible, it
131is also the least efficient: in particular,
132.Fn innetgr 3
133lookups will be especially slow if the
134database is large.
135.El
136.Sh FILES
137.Bl -tag -width /etc/netgroup -compact
138.It Pa /etc/netgroup
139the netgroup database.
140.El
141.Sh SEE ALSO
142.Xr getnetgrent 3 ,
143.Xr exports 5
144.Sh COMPATIBILITY
145The file format is compatible with that of various vendors, however it
146appears that not all vendors use an identical format.
147.Sh BUGS
148The interpretation of access restrictions based on the member tuples of a
149netgroup is left up to the various network applications.
150Also, it is not obvious how the domain specification
151applies to the BSD environment.
152.Pp
153The
154.Nm netgroup
155database should be stored in the form of a
156hashed
157.Xr db 3
158database just like the
159.Xr passwd 5
160database to speed up reverse lookups.
161