NSS and db

[Marcus Harnisch <marcus@harnisch.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de>]

Hi all

I am in a discussion on another mailing list concerning the NSS
databases.

db-Makefile generates Berkeley-DB files from the standard passwd,
group, etc. files. I the following will stick to the passwd database.

Apparently the awk-script to generate the makedb input stream creates
three key-types to describe an entry in /etc/passwd:
  1. '.<username>'
  2. '=<uid>'
  3. '0<serial number>'

I wonder what the serial number is used for. I guessed that there is a
convention that getXXXent() has to return entries in the same order as
they appear in /etc/passwd, which would IMHO not be a very good idea.

Leaving out the serial number entry could reduce the size of the DB by
about one third!

Regards,
	Marcus
-- 
	  Some operating systems are called `user friendly',
		  UNIX however is `expert friendly'.

    Marcus Harnisch <mailto:marcus@harnisch.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de>