Manpages - avahi-daemon.8

avahi-daemon - The Avahi mDNS/DNS-SD daemon

avahi-daemon [*/options/*]

avahi-daemon –kill

avahi-daemon –reload

avahi-daemon –check

The Avahi mDNS/DNS-SD daemon implements Apple’s Zeroconf architecture (also known as “Rendezvous” or “Bonjour”). The daemon registers local IP addresses and static services using mDNS/DNS-SD and provides two IPC APIs for local programs to make use of the mDNS record cache the avahi-daemon maintains. First there is the so called “simple protocol” which is used exclusively by avahi-dnsconfd (a daemon which configures unicast DNS servers using server info published via mDNS) and nss-mdns (a libc NSS plugin, providing name resolution via mDNS). Finally there is the D-Bus interface which provides a rich object oriented interface to D-Bus enabled applications.

Upon startup avahi-daemon interprets its configuration file /etc/avahi/avahi-daemon.conf and reads XML fragments from /etc/avahi/services/*.service which may define static DNS-SD services. If you enable publish-resolv-conf-dns-servers in avahi-daemon.conf the file /etc/resolv.conf will be read, too.

-f | –file= FILE

Specify the configuration file to read. (default: /etc/avahi/avahi-daemon.conf)

-D | –daemonize

Daemonize after startup. Implies –syslog.

-s | –syslog

Log to syslog instead of STDERR. Implied by –daemonize.

–debug

Increase verbosity to debug level.

–no-rlimits

Don’t enforce resource limits as specified in the configuration file. (See setrlimit(2) for more information)

–no-drop-root

Don’t drop root privileges after startup and don’t require daemon to be started as root. We recommend not to use this option.

–no-chroot

Don’t chroot(2) the daemon. This option is only available when compiled with chroot() support.

–no-proc-title

Don’t change the process name while running. Unless this option is specified avahi-daemon will reflect its current state and the selected host name in the process title.

-k | –kill

Kill an already running avahi-daemon. (equivalent to sending a SIGTERM)

-r | –reload

Tell an already running avahi-daemon to reread /etc/resolv.conf (in case you enabled publish-resolv-conf-dns-servers in avahi-daemon.conf) the files from etc/avahi/services. Please note that this will not reload the /etc/avahi/avahi-daemon.conf. (equivalent to sending a SIGHUP)

-c | –check

Return 0 as return code when avahi-daemon is already running.

-h | –help

Show help

-v | –version

Show version information

/etc/avahi/avahi-daemon.conf: the default configuration file for avahi-daemon, avahi-daemon.conf(5) for more information.

/etc/avahi/hosts: additional static hostname mappings to publish in mDNS, see avahi.hosts(5) for more information.

/etc/avahi/services/*.service: static service definitions, see avahi.service(5) for more information.

SIGINT, SIGTERM: avahi-daemon will shutdown. (Same as –kill).

SIGHUP: avahi-daemon will reload unicast DNS server data from /etc/resolv.conf and static service definitions from etc/avahi/services. (Same as –reload)

SIGUSR1: avahi-daemon will dump local and remote cached resource record data to syslog.

The Avahi Developers <avahi (at) lists (dot) freedesktop (dot) org>; Avahi is available from http://avahi.org/

avahi-daemon.conf(5), avahi.hosts(5), avahi.service(5), avahi-dnsconfd(8), avahi-set-host-name(1)

http://avahi.org/wiki/AvahiAndUnicastDotLocal documents the problems when using Avahi in a unicast DNS zone .local.