fingerd(8) [centos man page]
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 sup- posed 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, operating 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 sec- onds. Starting and stopping the daemon is handled by systemd(1). Fingerd is not enabled by default after the installation. Its running state can be managed using systemctl(1) commands. If you need to specify some options to fingerd you should copy the finger@.service file from /lib/systemd/system to /etc/systemd/system and edit it there. The finger protocol consists mostly of specifying command arguments. The systemd(1) 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 pos- sible derivations are returned. SEE ALSO
finger(1), systemd(1), systemctl(1) 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)
Check Out this Related Man Page
FINGERD(8) BSD System Manager's Manual FINGERD(8) NAME
fingerd -- remote user information server SYNOPSIS
fingerd [-8ghlmpSsu] [-P filename] DESCRIPTION
fingerd is a simple protocol based on RFC 1288 that provides an interface to the Name and Finger programs at several network sites. The pro- gram 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 required 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 handed a connection, fingerd reads a single command line terminated by a <CRLF> which it then passes 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 pos- sible derivations are returned. The following options may be passed to fingerd as server program arguments in /etc/inetd.conf: -8 Enable 8-bit output. -g Do not show any gecos information besides the users' real names. -h Display the name of the remote host in short mode, instead of the office location and office phone. -l Enable logging. The name of the host originating the query, and the actual request is reported via syslog(3) at LOG_NOTICE priority. 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 Prevent matching of user names. User is usually a login name; however, matching will also be done on the users' real names, unless 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 specifying a customized local server, this option allows a system manager to have more control over what information is pro- vided 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 remote client. -s Disable forwarding of queries to other remote hosts. -u Queries without a user name are rejected. SEE ALSO
finger(1), inetd(8) HISTORY
The fingerd command appeared in 4.3BSD. BUGS
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. BSD
September 12, 2002 BSD