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From: bzs@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Barry Shein)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards,comp.bugs.4bsd
Subject: What mode should `whois' be?
Message-ID: <2784@bu-cs.BU.EDU>
Date: Thu, 4-Dec-86 20:54:04 EST
Article-I.D.: bu-cs.2784
Posted: Thu Dec  4 20:54:04 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 5-Dec-86 05:17:20 EST
Organization: Boston U. Comp. Sci.
Lines: 18
Xref: mnetor comp.unix.wizards:247 comp.bugs.4bsd:52


From: earle@smeagol.UUCP (Greg Earle)
>When I run `whois' as root, everything works fine.  When I run `whois' as
>any plain user, I get:
>
>whois: bind: Permission denied

Yes, whois tries to bind the whois socket as provided by /etc/services
(officially 43.) This requires root priviliges, setuid it if you want it
to work.

You also realize, I hope, that by default it is trying to make an
ARPAnet link across to SRI-NIC, so you'll have to be able to route
there (or specify a local server via -h on the command line.)

It's not a bug. It even works when set up properly.

	-Barry Shein, Boston University