Uucp Implementation Description

D. A. Nowitz

ABSTRACT

      Uucp is a series of programs designed to permit communication between UNIX systems using either dial-up or hardwired communication lines. This document gives a detailed implementation description of the current (second) implementation of uucp.

      This document is for use by an administrator/installer of the system. It is not meant as a user's guide.

Introduction

Uucp is a series of programs designed to permit communication between UNIXsystems using either dial-up or hardwired communication lines. It is used for file transfers and remote command execution. The first version of the system was designed and implemented by M. E. Lesk.1 This paper describes the current (second) implementation of the system.

Uucp is a batch type operation. Files are created in a spool directory for processing by the uucp demons. There are three types of files used for the execution of work. Data files contain data for transfer to remote systems. Work files contain directions for file transfers between systems. Execution files are directions for UNIXcommand executions which involve the resources of one or more systems.

The uucp system consists of four primary and two secondary programs. The primary programs are:

uucp
This program creates work and gathers data files in the spool directory for the transmission of files.
uux
This program creates work files, execute files and gathers data files for the remote execution of UNIXcommands.
uucico
This program executes the work files for data transmission.
uuxqt
This program executes the execution files for UNIXcommand execution.

The secondary programs are:

uulog
This program updates the log file with new entries and reports on the status of uucp requests.
uuclean
This program removes old files from the spool directory.

The remainder of this paper will describe the operation of each program, the installation of the system, the security aspects of the system, the files required for execution, and the administration of the system.

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