NIS: ypcat passwd works fine but id "user" does not for new users in the domain

[Hoefnix]

I have a problem with pushing new users in a NIS domain. When I update the passwd file on the NIS master and the runs a make the new users are pushed to all slave servers.

On most slave server I can do an ypcat passwd and grep the new users and also I am able to ask "id ".

On one slave server I can do the ypcat passwd and find the new users, but the "id " response with "Can't find user "

I restarted the nis-slave server processes and also restarted the client.
I did also an ypset .
Still the same result on this slave server.

I also did an ypinit -m on the failing slave server but no result, id command fails for the new users.

The id command works fine for already existing users.

Does anyone have an idea where to look for mistake in the configuration.

It did work in the past we did not change the slave/master server config and also no network changes are implemented recent.

Thanks in advance,

Peter

[G. Vrijhoeven]

Putting it back on top.

We did a:
restart of the nis client, an ypset a restart of the nis slave server and a ypinit -s with no results. any ideas?


Gideon

[Olivier Drouin]

Check /etc/nsswitch.conf

Do you have a line that looks more or less like this ?


passwd: files [NOTFOUND=continue] nis


If not, try it.

O

[Hoefnix]

It does not look like this, but can't check it out now, come back on it in the morning.

Regard,

Peter

Ps. Good night to you Gideon ;-)

[G. Vrijhoeven]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply.
Its set the same on all nodes:

passwd: compat


Gideon

[A. Clay Stephenson · Accepted solution]

If ypcat works, the problem must be with the id command itself. You don't bother to identify the OS but I would look for cumulative libc patches and search the patch database for " id". I would also compare the passwd and group '+' entries on a "good" and "bad" client.

If this is an 11.x box, I would also shutdown the passwd/group lookup daemon, pwgrd, and see if the problem persists. The system will run just fine without pwgrd. Also make certain that you have free filesystem space in all filesystems.

[Olivier Drouin]

Also check if the home directory of the user as returned by ypcat is mounted on the machine (or if it exists).

I dont think you would get the same error message though...

[Hoefnix]

I think Clay was right. Last nigth the system rebooted because of failures on the LAN interfaces (in MC/ServiceG cluster).

After the reboot the id and ypcat reported the correct information for the new entered users.

Thanks all.

Regards,

Peter Geluk & Gideon Vrijhoeven

[Robert Binkhorst]

Clay is right, I've seen this problem before and it is indeed down to the pwgrd, a caching daemon. Sometimes this one doesn't get updated. Restarting it has always fixed this problem for me (on 11i).