pw groupadd/useradd fail when the nscd cache is used for name/group resolution

[Ulrich Spörlein]

On Thu, 09.07.2009 at 16:13:25 +0300, Vlad Galu wrote:
> I've stumbled upon this while installing postgres. In
> /etc/nsswitch.conf I had "group: cache files compat" and "passwd:
> cache files compat". Once I commented them out things started working
> again. Before the change, this is how it looked like:
> 
> -- cut here --
> [root at vgalu /usr/ports/databases/postgresql84-server]# pw group add pgsql -g 70
> pw: group disappeared during update
> [root at vgalu /usr/ports/databases/postgresql84-server]# pw group add pgsql -g 70
> pw: group 'pgsql' already exists
> [root at vgalu /usr/ports/databases/postgresql84-server]#
> -- and here --
> 
> Shouldn't 'files' be used upon a cache miss? If this is a PEBKAC,
> sorry for the noise.

Just a me too. This is most likely because nscd is also caching negative
lookups. The usual workaround would be to restart it using
/etc/rc.d/nscd restart

Cheers,
Ulrich Spörlein