nss_db

A fork of nss_db, modified to work on Solaris as well as Linux. This provides an alternative location for storing configuration information used by the Name Service Switch libraries, and may be used to supplement user, group and other information in a Berkeley DB.

The Berkeley DB NSS module provides an alternative means for storing configuration information traditionally kept in several plain-text files in /etc (e.g. /etc/passwd). The module uses the Berkeley DB Library to store this information in several database files in /var/db (e.g. /var/db/passwd.db). Using these databases can lead to a considerable speed-up if the files in /etc are large (e.g. on a system with a lot of accounts). The databases may also be used as a local cache for network accounts, or as a means to supplement or override UIDs, GIDs, home directories etc. provided by network accounts.