Troubleshooting

Troubleshooting Kerberos

Troubleshooting Kerberos

When troubleshooting problems with Kerberos, you need a reference point to work from. For example, does the problem exist on the remote system or on the local system? However, the terms “local” and “remote” are limited in their description of complex communications, such as when a local system logs onto a remote system and then the remote system logs back onto the local system. At that point, which is the local system and which is the remote system?

A better solution is to use the terms “client” and “server.” The term “client” refers to a process that is requesting a service from another process. The term “server” refers to a process or host that performs operations requested by local or remote hosts that are running client processes.

A typical network service consists of two co-operating programs. The client program runs on the requesting system. The server program runs on the system with which you want your system to communicate. The client program initiates requests to communicate. The server program accepts requests for communication. For example, the network service rlogin is the client program that requests a login to a remote HP-UXor UNIX system. When the request to log in is received on the remote host by inetd, inetd invokes the server program for rlogin (called rlogind) to handle the service request.

Error Messages

The error messages generated by a service as seen on the client can be generated by the client or the server. Error messages from the client occur before a connection is completely established. Error messages from the server occur after a connection is completely established.

Logging Capabilities

System logging is handled differently by the security server.

Chapter 9

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