Summary: Numbers rather than names for user in ls command

From: <amy_at_aloha.gsfc.nasa.gov>
Date: Mon, 13 Mar 95 09:48:59 -0500

My original Question:

>I have a 3000/300 AXP, and I just installed OSF1 V3.2 on it.

>...Sometimes when I do an ls, numbers come up for the owner, or group, or
>both. The numbers are not representative of the actual UID or
>GID, although they are consistent within the listing. The files
>for which this happens seem to be randomly distributed.
>It happens much more frequently with files on nfs mounted
>filesystems and with files which I have imported.

>If I reset the IDs back to the correct owner and group, they stay that
>way the next time I ls.

>Is this a bug or a feature? And how do I set it back to the original,
>showing-actual-names state?


I got a couple of me-too's, and an explanation from Dr. Thomas P. Blinn
of DEC. My problem was solved by setting up aliases in my passwd file for
alternate P & G ID's on different systems.

explanation follows:

>tpb_at_zk3.dec.com writes:
>The owner and group identification is actually stored as a number in the
>file system, not as a name string. The name strings come from the passwd
>and group files in /etc or from NIS (if you're using it and allow use of the
>NIS passwd and group databases). If the numeric value doesn't translate to
>a name string on your local system, then you'll see the number in the "ls"
>listing (or anything else that uses the same library calls ls uses to get a
>user ID or group ID to name translation).

>This is normal, especially for NFS mounted file systems, unless you've got a
>consistent definition of user IDs and group IDs across all your systems.

>You may be messing up some other system when you change the ownerships. You
>should be figuring out why you've got mis-matches in the user and group IDs
>on different systems in the same naming domain.

Thanks very much, Dr. Blinn

__________________________________________________________________________
Amy Skowronek Solar Data Analysis Center
amy_at_aloha.gsfc.nasa.gov NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
Received on Mon Mar 13 1995 - 09:49:36 NZDT

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