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Annotation of 43BSDTahoe/man/man8/inetd.8, revision 1.1

1.1     ! root        1: .\" Copyright (c) 1985 Regents of the University of California.
        !             2: .\" All rights reserved.  The Berkeley software License Agreement
        !             3: .\" specifies the terms and conditions for redistribution.
        !             4: .\"
        !             5: .\"    @(#)inetd.8     6.4 (Berkeley) 5/26/86
        !             6: .\"
        !             7: .TH INETD 8 "May 26, 1986"
        !             8: .UC 6
        !             9: .SH NAME
        !            10: inetd \- internet ``super\-server''
        !            11: .SH SYNOPSIS
        !            12: .B /etc/inetd
        !            13: [
        !            14: .B \-d
        !            15: ] [ configuration file ]
        !            16: .SH DESCRIPTION
        !            17: .I Inetd
        !            18: should be run at boot time by
        !            19: .IR /etc/rc.local .
        !            20: It then listens for connections on certain
        !            21: internet sockets.  When a connection is found on one
        !            22: of its sockets, it decides what service the socket
        !            23: corresponds to, and invokes a program to service the request.
        !            24: After the program is
        !            25: finished, it continues to listen on the socket (except in some cases which
        !            26: will be described below).  Essentially,
        !            27: .I inetd
        !            28: allows running one daemon to invoke several others,
        !            29: reducing load on the system.
        !            30: .PP
        !            31: Upon execution,
        !            32: .I inetd
        !            33: reads its configuration information from a configuration
        !            34: file which, by default, is
        !            35: .IR /etc/inetd.conf .
        !            36: There must be an entry for each field of the configuration
        !            37: file, with entries for each field separated by a tab or
        !            38: a space.  Comments are denoted by a ``#'' at the beginning
        !            39: of a line.  There must be an entry for each field.  The
        !            40: fields of the configuration file are as follows:
        !            41: .br
        !            42:        service name
        !            43: .br
        !            44:        socket type
        !            45: .br
        !            46:        protocol
        !            47: .br
        !            48:        wait/nowait
        !            49: .br
        !            50:        user
        !            51: .br
        !            52:        server program
        !            53: .br
        !            54:        server program arguments
        !            55: .PP
        !            56: The
        !            57: .I service name
        !            58: entry is the name of a valid service in
        !            59: the file
        !            60: .IR /etc/services/ .
        !            61: For ``internal'' services (discussed below), the service
        !            62: name
        !            63: .I must
        !            64: be the official name of the service (that is, the first entry in
        !            65: .IR /etc/services ).
        !            66: .PP
        !            67: The
        !            68: .I socket type
        !            69: should be one of ``stream'', ``dgram'', ``raw'', ``rdm'', or ``seqpacket'',
        !            70: depending on whether the socket is a stream, datagram, raw,
        !            71: reliably delivered message, or sequenced packet socket.
        !            72: .PP
        !            73: The
        !            74: .I protocol
        !            75: must be a valid protocol as given in
        !            76: .IR /etc/protocols .
        !            77: Examples might be ``tcp'' or ``udp''.
        !            78: .PP
        !            79: The
        !            80: .I wait/nowait
        !            81: entry is applicable to datagram sockets only (other sockets should
        !            82: have a ``nowait'' entry in this space).  If a datagram server connects
        !            83: to its peer, freeing the socket so
        !            84: .I inetd
        !            85: can received further messages on the socket, it is said to be
        !            86: a ``multi-threaded'' server, and should use the ``nowait''
        !            87: entry.  For datagram servers which process all incoming datagrams
        !            88: on a socket and eventually time out, the server is said to be
        !            89: ``single-threaded'' and should use a ``wait'' entry.  ``Comsat'' (``biff'')
        !            90: and ``talk'' are both examples of the latter type of
        !            91: datagram server.
        !            92: .I Tftpd
        !            93: is an exception; it is a datagram server that establishes pseudo-connections.
        !            94: It must be listed as ``wait'' in order to avoid a race;
        !            95: the server reads the first packet, creates a new socket,
        !            96: and then forks and exits to allow
        !            97: .I inetd
        !            98: to check for new service requests to spawn new servers.
        !            99: .PP
        !           100: The
        !           101: .I user
        !           102: entry should contain the user name of the user as whom the server
        !           103: should run.  This allows for servers to be given less permission
        !           104: than root.
        !           105: The
        !           106: .I server program
        !           107: entry should contain the pathname of the program which is to be
        !           108: executed by
        !           109: .I inetd
        !           110: when a request is found on its socket.  If
        !           111: .I inetd
        !           112: provides this service internally, this entry should
        !           113: be ``internal''.
        !           114: .PP
        !           115: The arguments to the server program should be just as they
        !           116: normally are, starting with argv[0], which is the name of
        !           117: the program.  If the service is provided internally, the
        !           118: word ``internal'' should take the place of this entry.
        !           119: .PP
        !           120: .I Inetd
        !           121: provides several ``trivial'' services internally by use of
        !           122: routines within itself.  These services are ``echo'',
        !           123: ``discard'', ``chargen'' (character generator), ``daytime''
        !           124: (human readable time), and ``time'' (machine readable time,
        !           125: in the form of the number of seconds since midnight, January
        !           126: 1, 1900).  All of these services are tcp based.  For
        !           127: details of these services, consult the appropriate RFC
        !           128: from the Network Information Center.
        !           129: .PP
        !           130: .I Inetd
        !           131: rereads its configuration file when it receives a hangup signal, SIGHUP.
        !           132: Services may be added, deleted or modified when the configuration file
        !           133: is reread.
        !           134: .SH "SEE ALSO"
        !           135: comsat(8C), ftpd(8C), rexecd(8C), rlogind(8C), rshd(8C),
        !           136: telnetd(8C), tftpd(8C)

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