NSS(5) Linux Programmer's Manual NSS(5)
NAME
nss - Name Service Switch configuration file
DESCRIPTION
Each call to a function which retrieves data from a system database
like the password or group database is handled by the Name Service
Switch implementation in the GNU C library. The various services pro-
vided are implemented by independent modules, each of which naturally
varies widely from the other.
The default implementations coming with the GNU C library are by de-
fault conservative and do not use unsafe data. This might be very
costly in some situations, especially when the databases are large.
Some modules allow the system administrator to request taking shortcuts
if these are known to be safe. It is then the system administrator's
responsibility to ensure the assumption is correct.
There are other modules where the implementation changed over time. If
an implementation used to sacrifice speed for memory consumption, it
might create problems if the preference is switched.
The /etc/default/nss file contains a number of variable assignments.
Each variable controls the behavior of one or more NSS modules. White
spaces are ignored. Lines beginning with '#' are treated as comments.
The variables currently recognized are:
NETID_AUTHORITATIVE = TRUE|FALSE
If set to TRUE, the NIS backend for the initgroups(3) function
will accept the information from the netid.byname NIS map as au-
thoritative. This can speed up the function significantly if
the group.byname map is large. The content of the netid.byname
map is used as is. The system administrator has to make sure it
is correctly generated.
SERVICES_AUTHORITATIVE = TRUE|FALSE
If set to TRUE, the NIS backend for the getservbyname(3) and
getservbyname_r(3) functions will assume that the services.by-
servicename NIS map exists and is authoritative, particularly
that it contains both keys with /proto and without /proto for
both primary service names and service aliases. The system ad-
ministrator has to make sure it is correctly generated.
SETENT_BATCH_READ = TRUE|FALSE
If set to TRUE, the NIS backend for the setpwent(3) and set-
grent(3) functions will read the entire database at once and
then hand out the requests one by one from memory with every
corresponding getpwent(3) or getgrent(3) call respectively.
Otherwise, each getpwent(3) or getgrent(3) call might result in
a network communication with the server to get the next entry.
FILES
/etc/default/nss
EXAMPLES
The default configuration corresponds to the following configuration
file:
NETID_AUTHORITATIVE=FALSE
SERVICES_AUTHORITATIVE=FALSE
SETENT_BATCH_READ=FALSE
SEE ALSO
nsswitch.conf
COLOPHON
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Linux 2020-06-09 NSS(5)