FINGERD(8) BSD System Manager's Manual FINGERD(8)
fingerd - remote user information server
fingerd [-lMmpSsu] [-P filename]
fingerd is a simple protocol based on RFC 1288 that provides an interface
to the Name and Finger programs at several network sites. The program is
supposed to return a friendly, human-oriented status report on either the
system at the moment or a particular person in depth. There is no re-
quired format and the protocol consists mostly of specifying a single
"command line".
fingerd is started by inetd(8), which listens for TCP requests at port
79. Once connected it reads a single command line terminated by a <CRLF>
which is passed to finger(1). fingerd closes its connections as soon as
the output is finished.
If the line is null (i.e., just a <CRLF> is sent) then finger(1) returns
a "default" report that lists all people logged into the system at that
moment.
If a user name is specified (e.g., eric<CRLF>) then the response lists
more extended information for only that particular user, whether logged
in or not. Allowable "names" in the command line include both "login
names" and "user names". If a name is ambiguous, all possible derivations
are returned.
The following options may be passed to fingerd as server program argu-
ments in /etc/inetd.conf:
-l Enable logging. The name of the host originating the query and
the actual request is reported via syslog(3) at LOG_NOTICE prior-
ity. A request of the form '/W' or '/w' will return long output.
Empty requests will return all currently logged in users. All
other requests look for specific users. See RFC 1288 for details.
-M Enables matching of user names. This is disabled by default if
the system is running YP.
-m Prevent matching of user names. User is usually a login name;
however, matching will also be done on the users' real names, un-
less the -m option is supplied.
-P filename
Use an alternate program as the local information provider. The
default local program executed by fingerd is finger(1). By speci-
fying a customized local server, this option allows a system
manager to have more control over what information is provided to
remote sites.
-p Prevents finger(1) from displaying the contents of the ".plan"
and ".project" files.
-S Prints user information in short mode, one line per user. This
overrides the "Whois switch" that may be passed in from the re-
mote client.
-s Enable secure mode. Forwarding of queries to other remote hosts
is denied.
-u Queries without a user name are rejected.
finger(1), inetd(8)
The fingerd command appeared in 4.3BSD.
Connecting directly to the server from a TIP or an equally narrow-minded
TELNET-protocol user program can result in meaningless attempts at option
negotiation being sent to the server, which will foul up the command line
interpretation. fingerd should be taught to filter out IAC's and perhaps
even respond negatively (IAC WON'T) to all option commands received.
MirBSD #10-current June 4, 1993 1