rcmd(3) — Linux manual page

NAME | LIBRARY | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | RETURN VALUE | ATTRIBUTES | STANDARDS | HISTORY | BUGS | SEE ALSO | COLOPHON

rcmd(3)                 Library Functions Manual                 rcmd(3)

NAME         top

       rcmd, rresvport, iruserok, ruserok, rcmd_af, rresvport_af,
       iruserok_af, ruserok_af - routines for returning a stream to a
       remote command

LIBRARY         top

       Standard C library (libc, -lc)

SYNOPSIS         top

       #include <netdb.h>    /* Or <unistd.h> on some systems */

       int rcmd(char **restrict ahost, unsigned short inport,
                   const char *restrict locuser,
                   const char *restrict remuser,
                   const char *restrict cmd, int *restrict fd2p);

       int rresvport(int *port);

       int iruserok(uint32_t raddr, int superuser,
                   const char *ruser, const char *luser);
       int ruserok(const char *rhost, int superuser,
                   const char *ruser, const char *luser);

       int rcmd_af(char **restrict ahost, unsigned short inport,
                   const char *restrict locuser,
                   const char *restrict remuser,
                   const char *restrict cmd, int *restrict fd2p,
                   sa_family_t af);

       int rresvport_af(int *port, sa_family_t af);

       int iruserok_af(const void *restrict raddr, int superuser,
                   const char *restrict ruser, const char *restrict luser,
                   sa_family_t af);
       int ruserok_af(const char *rhost, int superuser,
                   const char *ruser, const char *luser,
                   sa_family_t af);

   Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see
   feature_test_macros(7)):

       rcmd(), rcmd_af(), rresvport(), rresvport_af(), iruserok(),
       iruserok_af(), ruserok(), ruserok_af():
           Since glibc 2.19:
               _DEFAULT_SOURCE
           glibc 2.19 and earlier:
               _BSD_SOURCE

DESCRIPTION         top

       The rcmd() function is used by the superuser to execute a command
       on  a  remote  machine  using  an  authentication scheme based on
       privileged port numbers.  The rresvport() function returns a file
       descriptor to a socket with an address  in  the  privileged  port
       space.   The  iruserok()  and  ruserok()  functions  are  used by
       servers to authenticate clients requesting service  with  rcmd().
       All four functions are used by the rshd(8) server (among others).

   rcmd()
       The   rcmd()   function   looks   up   the   host   *ahost  using
       gethostbyname(3), returning  -1  if  the  host  does  not  exist.
       Otherwise,  *ahost  is set to the standard name of the host and a
       connection is established to a server residing at the  well-known
       Internet port inport.

       If  the  connection  succeeds, a socket in the Internet domain of
       type SOCK_STREAM is returned to the  caller,  and  given  to  the
       remote  command as stdin and stdout.  If fd2p is nonzero, then an
       auxiliary channel to a control process will be set up, and a file
       descriptor for it will be placed in *fd2p.  The  control  process
       will  return  diagnostic output from the command (unit 2) on this
       channel, and will also accept bytes on this channel as being UNIX
       signal numbers, to be forwarded  to  the  process  group  of  the
       command.   If  fd2p  is  0, then the stderr (unit 2 of the remote
       command) will be made the same as the stdout and no provision  is
       made  for  sending  arbitrary  signals  to  the  remote  process,
       although you may be able to get its attention  by  using  out-of-
       band data.

       The protocol is described in detail in rshd(8).

   rresvport()
       The  rresvport()  function  is  used  to  obtain  a socket with a
       privileged port bound to it.  This socket is suitable for use  by
       rcmd()  and  several other functions.  Privileged ports are those
       in the range 0 to 1023.  Only a privileged process (on  Linux,  a
       process  that has the CAP_NET_BIND_SERVICE capability in the user
       namespace governing its network namespace) is allowed to bind  to
       a  privileged  port.   In the glibc implementation, this function
       restricts its search to the ports from 512  to  1023.   The  port
       argument  is  value-result:  the value it supplies to the call is
       used as the starting point for a  circular  search  of  the  port
       range;  on  (successful) return, it contains the port number that
       was bound to.

   iruserok() and ruserok()
       The iruserok() and ruserok() functions take a  remote  host's  IP
       address   or   name,  respectively,  two  usernames  and  a  flag
       indicating  whether  the  local  user's  name  is  that  of   the
       superuser.  Then, if the user is not the superuser, it checks the
       /etc/hosts.equiv  file.   If  that  lookup  is  not  done,  or is
       unsuccessful, the .rhosts in the local user's home  directory  is
       checked to see if the request for service is allowed.

       If  this  file does not exist, is not a regular file, is owned by
       anyone other than the user  or  the  superuser,  is  writable  by
       anyone other than the owner, or is hardlinked anywhere, the check
       automatically  fails.   Zero  is  returned if the machine name is
       listed in the hosts.equiv file, or the host and  remote  username
       are found in the .rhosts file; otherwise iruserok() and ruserok()
       return -1.  If the local domain (as obtained from gethostname(2))
       is  the  same as the remote domain, only the machine name need be
       specified.

       If the IP address of the remote host is known, iruserok()  should
       be  used  in  preference  to  ruserok(),  as  it does not require
       trusting the DNS server for the remote host's domain.

   *_af() variants
       All of the functions described above  work  with  IPv4  (AF_INET)
       sockets.   The  "_af" variants take an extra argument that allows
       the socket address family to be specified.  For these  functions,
       the  af  argument  can  be  specified as AF_INET or AF_INET6.  In
       addition, rcmd_af() supports the use of AF_UNSPEC.

RETURN VALUE         top

       The rcmd() function returns a valid socket descriptor on success.
       It returns -1 on error and prints a  diagnostic  message  on  the
       standard error.

       The rresvport() function returns a valid, bound socket descriptor
       on success.  On failure, it returns -1 and sets errno to indicate
       the  error.   The  error  code EAGAIN is overloaded to mean: "All
       network ports in use".

       For information on the return from ruserok() and iruserok(),  see
       above.

ATTRIBUTES         top

       For  an  explanation  of  the  terms  used  in  this section, see
       attributes(7).
       ┌──────────────────────────────┬───────────────┬────────────────┐
       │ Interface                    Attribute     Value          │
       ├──────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼────────────────┤
       │ rcmd(), rcmd_af()            │ Thread safety │ MT-Unsafe      │
       ├──────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼────────────────┤
       │ rresvport(), rresvport_af()  │ Thread safety │ MT-Safe        │
       ├──────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼────────────────┤
       │ iruserok(), ruserok(),       │ Thread safety │ MT-Safe locale │
       │ iruserok_af(), ruserok_af()  │               │                │
       └──────────────────────────────┴───────────────┴────────────────┘

STANDARDS         top

       BSD.

HISTORY         top

       iruserok_af()
       rcmd_af()
       rresvport_af()
       ruserok_af()
              glibc 2.2.

       Solaris, 4.2BSD.  The "_af" variants are more recent additions,
       and are not present on as wide a range of systems.

BUGS         top

       iruserok() and iruserok_af() are declared in glibc headers only
       since glibc 2.12.

SEE ALSO         top

       rlogin(1), rsh(1), rexec(3), rexecd(8), rlogind(8), rshd(8)

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of the man-pages (Linux kernel and C library
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Linux man-pages 6.9.1          2024-05-02                        rcmd(3)

Pages that refer to this page: rexec(3)