IMPORT(4)

NAME

import − import a name space from a remote system

SYNOPSIS

import [ options ] system file [ mountpoint ]

import -B [ options ] mountpoint [ cmd [ args ... ] ]

DESCRIPTION

Import allows an arbitrary file on a remote system to be imported into the local name space. Usually file is a directory, so the complete file tree under the directory is made available.

A process is started on the remote machine, with authority of the user of import, to perform work for the local machine using the exportfs(4) service. If mountpoint is omitted import uses the name of the remote file as the local mount point.

The options are:

-a -b -c -C
Control the construction of union directories, as in mount and bind(1). Only valid when file is a directory.

-B Run in “backwards” mode, described below.

-E enc
Push an authentication protocol on its network connection. The supported protocols are clear (the default, no protocol) and ssl. There are plans to make tls available.

-e ’enc auth’
Specify the encryption and authentication algorithms to use for encrypting the wire traffic (see ssl(3)). The defaults are rc4_256 and sha1.

-k keypattern
Use keypattern to select a key to authenticate to the remote side (see auth(2)).

-o -O
These equivalent flags run import in a pre-9P2000 compatibility mode to import from ancient servers.

-p Push the aan(8) filter onto the connection to protect against temporary network outages.

-s name
Post the connection’s mountable file descriptor as /srv/name.

The -B option runs import in “backwards” mode. In this mode, import runs a p9any authentication (as server) over its file descriptor 0 (expected to be an incoming network connection from exportfs -B), mounts the connection onto mntpt, and optionally runs cmd args.

EXAMPLES

Assume a machine kremvax that has IP interfaces for the company intranet and the global internet mounted on /net and /net.alt respectively. Any machine inside the company can get telnet out to the global internet using:

import -a kremvax /net.alt
telnet /net.alt/tcp!ucbvax

Suppose that the machine moscvax is has access to a private file server containing public web pages that need to be served by the less-trusted server webvax. Webvax runs the following listener (see listen(8)) on TCP port 999:

#!/bin/rc
import -B -s rowebfs /usr/web /bin/restarthttpd

When moscvax boots, it runs

exportfs -R -r /usr/web -B tcp!webvax!999

to serve a read-only copy of /usr/web to webvax. When webvax gets the call, import mounts the served tree onto its own /usr/web and then runs /bin/restarthttpd to restart httpd(8).

SOURCE

/sys/src/cmd/import.c

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