Oracle Solaris Naming Services
Most modern networks use two or more of these services in combination. The name
service switch coordinates the naming service that is used for a particular lookup. For more
information, see Chapter 2, “About the Name Service Switch”.
Naming Services and the Service Management
Facility
In Oracle Solaris, all naming services are managed by the Service Management Facility (SMF).
Configuration information is no longer stored in configuration files but in the SMF repository.
Refer to the individual chapters in this book for more information about how SMF works with a
specific naming service.
Legacy configuration files are retained in the Oracle Solaris 11 release only for purposes of
compatibility with previous Oracle Solaris releases. The SMF service that is relevant to the
specific naming service generates the contents of the legacy configuration files. You should no
longer use these files for naming service configuration. Instead, you must use the general SMF
commands such as svcs, svcadm, and svccfg.
When you upgrade from Oracle Solaris 10 to Oracle Solaris 11 and its update releases, the
system's name service configuration is automatically migrated to SMF. However, if necessary,
you can perform manual migration by using the nscfg command. For more information, see the
nscfg(1M) man page.
DNS Naming Service
The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical, distributed database implemented on a TCP/
IP network. It is primarily used to look up IP addresses for Internet host names and host names
for IP addresses. The data is distributed across the network and is located by using period-
separated names that are read from right to left. DNS is also used to store other Internet-related
host information, such as mail exchange routing information, location data, and available
services. The hierarchical nature of the service enables the local administration of local domains
while providing international coverage of other domains that are connected to the Internet, an
intranet, or both.
DNS clients request information about a system from one or more name servers and wait for a
response. DNS servers respond to requests from an information cache that was loaded from any
of the following sources:
20 Working With Oracle Solaris 11.3 Directory and Naming Services: DNS and NIS • October 2017
