How widespread is NIS support?

[Andrew MacIntyre]

On 18 Feb 2001, Andrew Kuchling wrote:

> Does anyone have an idea how widespread NIS support is these days?
> Patch #103544 changes the 2.1 setup.py script to compile the NIS
> module on any Unix platform, and I'm wondering if that's too
> ambitious.  Is anyone out there using a Unix *without* NIS?  (Try 'man
> yp_get_default_domain' and see if you get anything, for a start.)  Are
> the NIS functions part of libc, or in a different library (such as
> libnsl on Solaris).

Be aware (you probably are...) that there's NIS and NIS+.

FreeBSD supports NIS (though not NIS+) but doesn't have the
'yp_get_default_domain' man page you refer to.  I think the other BSDs and
most Linux distros are in the same boat.

>From memory (some time ago...) an older HP-UX system (8.0?) had NIS
support, so I would expect most commercial Unixen to have this.

Given the above, 'yp_get_default_domain' may be a NIS+ call, although
FreeBSD's nis (actually yp(4)) man page notes that many NIS functions
don't have man pages - the *BSDs & Linux using a freely distributable
implementation of NIS.

AFAIK, NIS+ is Solaris only, but its possible that SGI and HP may have
licensed it as well (I have access to no system of either of these latter
two to check).  I'm not aware of any freely available/distributable
implemention of NIS+.

--
Andrew I MacIntyre                     "These thoughts are mine alone..."
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