fingerd

FINGERD(8)                BSD System Manager's Manual               FINGERD(8)

NAME
     fingerd - remote user information server

SYNOPSIS
     fingerd [-wulf] [-pL path] [-t timeout]

DESCRIPTION
     Fingerd is a simple daemon based on RFC1196 that provides an interface to
     the ``finger'' program at most 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.

     If the -w option is given, remote users will get an additional ``Welcome
     to ...'' banner which also shows some informations (e.g. uptime, operat-
     ing system name and release) about the system the fingerd is running on.
     Some sites may consider this a security risk as it gives out information
     that may be useful to crackers.

     If the -u option is given, requests of the form ``finger @host'' are
     rejected.

     If the -l option is given, information about requests made is logged.
     This option probably violates users' privacy and should not be used on
     multiuser boxes.

     If the -f option is given, finger forwarding (user@host1@host2) is
     allowed.  Useful behind firewalls, but probably not wise for security and
     resource reasons.

     The -p option allows specification of an alternate location for fingerd
     to find the ``finger'' program. The -L option is equivalent.

     The -t option specifies the time to wait for a request before closing the
     connection.  A value of 0 waits forever.  The default is 60 seconds.

     Options to fingerd should be specified in /etc/xinetd.d/finger.

     The finger protocol consists mostly of specifying command arguments.  The
     xinetd(8) ``super-server'' runs fingerd for TCP requests received on port
     79.  Once connected fingerd reads a single command line terminated by a
     <CRLF> which is passed to finger(1).  It closes its connections as soon
     as all output is finished.

     If the line is empty (i.e. just a <CRLF> is sent) then finger returns a
     ``default'' report that lists all people logged into the system at that
     moment. This feature is blocked by the -u option.

     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 deriva-
     tions are returned.

SEE ALSO
     finger(1), xinetd(8)

RESTRICTIONS
     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.

HISTORY
     The finger daemon appeared in 4.3BSD.

Linux NetKit (0.17)             August 29, 1996            Linux NetKit (0.17)