YPINIT(8)

💖 YPINIT(8) — NIS Reference Manual 💖

okay bestie, sit down, hydrate, and let me tell you about ypinit — the NIS database install & build program. yes it's an 8th-section sysadmin thing, yes it's giving main-character root energy, no you cannot skip it. 🫶

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✨ NAME ✨

ypinit — NIS database install and build program. that's it, that's the name, she's simple and she's iconic. 💅

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

/usr/lib/yp/ypinit [-m] [-s master_name]

look at her. three whole pieces of syntax. a queen of restraint. 👑

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so here's the vibe: ypinit builds the domain subdirectory of /var/yp for the current default domain. and THEN — because she's not done, she never is — after building that domain subdirectory, ypinit builds a complete set of administrative maps for your system and drops them right into that directory. ✨

and here's the thing you actually need to remember: the first map created by ypinit -m is the ypservers map. like, that's the moment. that's the birth. 🎀

you should run it as root on the hosts, which should be the master ypserver. and fr fr — you should have only one master server per NIS domain. one. uno. не два. don't be chaotic about this. 💀

all databases are built from scratch, either from information available to the program at runtime, or from the ASCII data base files in /etc. those files are listed below under FILES, bestie, go look, they're right there. 🌈

an NIS database on a slave server is set up by copying an existing database from a running server. and the master_name argument? it should be the hostname of an NIS server — either the master server for all the maps, or a server on which the data base is up-to-date and stable. yes, "stable" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. we love a stable server. 🧚

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💅 OPTIONS 💅

• -m — if the local host is the NIS master. that's the whole thing. that's your "i am the main character" flag. 👑
• -s — set up a slave server with the database from master_name. note the little master_name — she needs a friend to copy from. 🫶

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🍓 FILES 🍓

these are the ASCII data base files in /etc that the databases get built from, and i need you to look at this list like it's a tracklist on an album you're obsessed with:

• /etc/passwd
• /etc/group
• /etc/hosts
• /etc/networks
• /etc/services
• /etc/protocols
• /etc/netgroup
• /etc/rpc

no skips. all bangers. 🎧✨

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🔥 SEE ALSO 🔥

go read these next, bestie, i'm literally begging:

• makedbm(8)
• revnetgroup(8)
• yppush(8)
• ypserv(8)
• ypxfr(8)

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💀 BUGS 💀

there is no good error handling at the moment.

and i'm not softening that one, because that's the actual text and it's the actual truth. if something goes wrong she is not going to hold your hand about it. dramatic? maybe. accurate? absolutely. 😭

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👑 AUTHOR 👑

Thorsten Kukuk <kukuk@linux-nis.org> — the icon, the legend, the moment. 🌟

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aaaand that's the whole page, you ate it, you're done, go build some maps. 🎀 this was the NIS Reference Manual, dated 12/31/2020, and it covers YPINIT(8). mwah. 💖