Provided by: nfs-kernel-server_2.6.4-3ubuntu5_amd64 bug

NAME

       nfsd - special filesystem for controlling Linux NFS server

SYNPOSIS

       mount -t nfsd nfsd /proc/fs/nfsd

DESCRIPTION

       The nfsd filesystem is a special filesystem which provides access to the Linux NFS server.
       Writing to files in this filesystem can affect the server.  Reading from them can  provide
       information about the server.

       As  well  as  this  filesystem,  there  are a collection of files in the procfs filesystem
       (normally mounted at /proc) which are used to control the NFS server.   This  manual  page
       describes all of these files.

       The  exportfs  and  mountd  programs  (part  of the nfs-utils package) expect to find this
       filesystem mounted at /proc/fs/nfsd or /proc/fs/nfs.

DETAILS

       Files in the nfsd filesystem include:

       exports
              This file contains a list of filesystems that are currently  exported  and  clients
              that  each  filesystem  is  exported to, together with a list of export options for
              that client/filesystem pair.  This is similar to the /proc/fs/nfs/exports  file  in
              2.4.   One  difference  is that a client doesn't necessarily correspond to just one
              host.  It can respond to a  large  collection  of  hosts  that  are  being  treated
              identically.

              Each  line of the file contains a path name, a client name, and a number of options
              in parentheses.  Any space, tab, newline or back-slash character in the  path  name
              or client name will be replaced by a backslash followed by the octal ASCII code for
              that character.

       threads
              This file represents the number of nfsd thread currently running.  Reading it  will
              show  the number of threads.  Writing an ASCII decimal number will cause the number
              of threads to be changed (increased or decreased  as  necessary)  to  achieve  that
              number.

       filehandle
              This  is  a somewhat unusual file  in that what is read from it depends on what was
              just written to it.  It provides a transactional interface where a program can open
              the  file,  write  a  request, and read a response.  If two separate programs open,
              write, and read at the same time, their requests will not be mixed up.

              The request written to filehandle should be a client  name,  a  path  name,  and  a
              number of bytes.  This should be followed by a newline, with white-space separating
              the fields, and octal quoting of special characters.

              On writing this, the program will be able to read back a filehandle for  that  path
              as  exported  to  the  given  client.   The filehandle's length will be at most the
              number of bytes given.

              The filehandle will be represented in hex with a leading '\x'.

       clients/
              This directory contains a subdirectory for each NFSv4 client.  Each file under that
              subdirectory  gives  some  details  about  the client in YAML format.  In addition,
              writing "expire\n" to the ctl file will force the server to immediately revoke  all
              state held by that client.

       The  directory  /proc/net/rpc  in  the  procfs  filesystem  contains a number of files and
       directories.  The files contain statistics that can be display using the nfsstat  program.
       The  directories contain information about various caches that the NFS server maintains to
       keep track of access permissions that different clients have  for  different  filesystems.
       The caches are:

       auth.unix.ip
              This  cache  contains  a  mapping from IP address to the name of the authentication
              domain that the ipaddress should be treated as part of.

       nfsd.export
              This cache contains a mapping from directory and domain to export options.

       nfsd.fh
              This cache contains a  mapping  from  domain  and  a  filesystem  identifier  to  a
              directory.   The filesystem identifier is stored in the filehandles and consists of
              a number indicating the type of identifier and a number of hex bytes indicating the
              content of the identifier.

       Each directory representing a cache can hold from 1 to 3 files.  They are:

       flush  When  a  number  of  seconds  since epoch (1 Jan 1970) is written to this file, all
              entries in the cache that were last updated before that file become invalidated and
              will  be  flushed  out.  Writing a time in the future (in seconds since epoch) will
              flush everything.  This is the only file that will always be present.

       content
              This file, if present, contains a textual  representation  of  ever  entry  in  the
              cache,  one  per  line.   If an entry is still in the cache (because it is actively
              being used) but has expired or is otherwise invalid, it  will  be  presented  as  a
              comment (with a leading hash character).

       channel
              This  file, if present, acts a channel for request from the kernel-based nfs server
              to be passed to a user-space program for handling.

              When the kernel needs some information which isn't in the cache, it  makes  a  line
              appear  in  the  channel  file  giving  the  key for the information.  A user-space
              program should read this, find the answer, and write a line containing the key,  an
              expiry time, and the content.  For example the kernel might make
                   nfsd 127.0.0.1
              appear in the auth.unix.ip/content file.  The user-space program might then write
                   nfsd 127.0.0.1 1057206953 localhost
              to indicate that 127.0.0.1 should map to localhost, at least for now.

              If  the  program  uses  select(2)  or  poll(2)  to discover if it can read from the
              channel then it will never see and end-of-file but  when  all  requests  have  been
              answered, it will block until another request appears.

       In  the  /proc  filesystem  there are 4 files that can be used to enabled extra tracing of
       nfsd and related code.  They are:
            /proc/sys/sunrpc/nfs_debug
            /proc/sys/sunrpc/nfsd_debug
            /proc/sys/sunrpc/nlm_debug
            /proc/sys/sunrpc/rpc_debug
       They control tracing for the NFS client, the NFS server, the Network Lock Manager  (lockd)
       and the underlying RPC layer respectively.  Decimal numbers can be read from or written to
       these files.  Each number represents a bit-pattern where bits that are set  cause  certain
       classes of tracing to be enabled.  Consult the kernel header files to find out what number
       correspond to what tracing.

NOTES

       This file system is only available in Linux 2.6 and later series kernels (and in the later
       parts  of  the 2.5 development series leading up to 2.6).  This man page does not apply to
       2.4 and earlier.

       Previously the nfsctl  systemcall  was  used  for  communication  between  nfsd  and  user
       utilities.   That  systemcall was removed in kernel version 3.1.  Older nfs-utils versions
       were able to fall back to nfsctl if necessary; that was removed from nfs-utils 1.3.5.

SEE ALSO

       nfsd(8), rpc.nfsd(8), exports(5), nfsstat(8), mountd(8) exportfs(8).

AUTHOR

       NeilBrown

                                           3 July 2003                                    nfsd(7)