This document lists the
majority of services available for any distribution of Linux.
The list includes a description of each service’s purpose, and a comment
regarding whether it is a required service. This listing is not specifically
directed at desktop or a server installation; it includes the services for both
types.
I will also list as
required only those services that the system must have functioning to run, not
services which act as enhancements. This listing is from the Mandriva Free 2006 Distribution and there are two
distribution specific items in the list, which I have specified within Table A.
I generated this list
by installing absolutely everything from the three CD-ROMs, not something you
will need to do. If you use this list as a guideline and see services listed
here that are not in your list, this is a good thing. You should actually never
see this long a list on any installation you intend to use.
Table A
| Alphabetical Listing of Services | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Service Name | Required [Yes/No] | Description | Comments |
| acon | No | Language support | Specifically for the right to left written languages: Arabic, Farsi and Hebrew |
| acpi | No | Power Management | laptop battery fan monitor |
| acpid | No | Listening daemon | This listens for and dispatches acpi events from the kernel |
| adsl | No | Internal ADSL switch control | Use this only if you have an internal adsl switch for your internet connection. |
| alsa | No | Advanced Linux Sound Architecture | The only sound system actually included in the kernel |
| anacron | No | Periodic Command Scheduler | a task scheduling tool |
| apmd | No | Power Management | Laptop power management |
| apmiser | No | Power Management | Yet another laptop battery extender |
| arpwatch | No | Ethernet ip address pairing monitor | monitors and logs remote ip addresses with hostnames. |
| atd | No | Periodic Command Scheduler | a task scheduling tool |
| autofs | No | Automount services | one of the several automounting of file systems on demand services. Some of which are distro specific, if the distro you are using has its own automount system, do not use this one. |
| bluetooth | No | The core of Bluetooth | For all Bluetooth services. |
| bootparamd | No | boot server | old means for booting diskless clients / thin clients, the newer method is the zeroconf system. |
| canna | No | Japanese conversion engine | |
| capi4linux | No | Basic CAPI subsystem | |
| cpqarrayd | No | Hardware Service | Compaq Raid Array Monitor |
| cpufreq | No | Hardware Service | Probes and configured CPU frequency daemon modules |
| cpufreqd | No | Hardware Service | This one will automatically scale cpu frequency to reduce overheating. Should be useful for over-clocking. |
| crond | Yes | Periodic Command Scheduler | THE task scheduling tool. |
| cups-lpd | No | Enables older Linux and commercial Unix systems to connect to cups server | Useful only if you have to allow older systems access to the printers |
| cups | Yes | Common Unix Printing System | A must have to enable printing |
| cvs | No | Concurrent Versioning system | For managing multi user documents. |
| devfsd | No | System Maintenance | This service only cleans up dynamic desktop directories; it is not needed unless your system crashes often. |
| dhcpd | No | The DHCP server | Is your network large enough that static IPs are a pain, then this will make it easier, giving you DHCP IP configuration for your network. |
| diald | No | Smart auto dialer for dialup networking | This service will connect to the network on demand, as in you type an email and hit send, it will connect you, send the email and disconnect you. |
| dkms | No | Autoinstall Boot for DKMS | Distro specific tool, for OEM style installations. This allows for a first boot setting of root password and user name password for regular use. the final configuration of the system. |
| dm | Yes | Display Manager | The core of the x-server, required for using any GUI. |
| dnbc | No | Digital Network Bind Chrooter | This is a simple bash script that puts a BIND server in a chroot jail. Install BIND, launch the script, and restart named |
| drakxtools_http | No | Miniserve administration server | Distro specific tool for remote system administration |
| dund | No | Bluetooth Dialup networking | |
| fam | No | File system Alteration Monitor | Logger for all changes to a file system. |
| finger | No | Remote access of data. | This server will allow remote access of user login data, last login date and time. useful for monitoring employee work habits when you are not in the office, major breach of security, in that you are effectively publishing confidential company data online |
| freshclam | Yes | ClamAV updater | Automatic updates for ClamAV |
| gpm | Yes | Mouse | Console mode mouse driver |
| haldaemon | No | Hardware Monitoring System | This monitors for hardware changes, will alter you to new or altered hardware. |
| harddrake | No | Hardware Service | Distro specific hardware detection and configuration |
| heartbeat | No | High Availability services | This is intended to increase the priority of critical servers and services |
| hidd | No | Bluetooth H.I.D. Server | |
| hplip | No | HP Linux Printing and Imaging | Older version of HP supplied drivers for their all in one products |
| hpoj | No | Pital?init, HP office jet printer drivers | Older drivers for HP office jet, newer drivers are included with cups drivers for the printers |
| httpd | No | Apache Web server | There are two reasons for this to be on a system, one is it is to be used as a Web server, the other it will be a Web site development machine. If neither is true, do not install Apache and this won’t be here. |
| hylafax?server | No | Enterprise Fax?modem service | This works for class 1 and class 2 fax modems only. This must be running if you intend to use hylafax to send a fax through the modem. This is not the only fax tool available. |
| ibod | No | ISDN MPPP bandwidth on demand | Useful with dialup networking, this will connect as needed to the network. |
| identd | No | Identification through TCP connection | |
| imaps | No | secure IMAP server | |
| imaps | No | IMAP server | |
| iplog | No | Logs TCP, UDP, ICMP connections with hostname of remote host | Useful network monitoring tool. |
| ipop2 | No | POP2 mail server | |
| ipop3 | No | POP3 mail server | |
| ipsec | No | Encrypted and Authenticated communications | KLIPS is the kernel half, PLUTO is the user space half. very useful for remote access situations |
| iptables | Yes | kernel based Packet Filtering firewall | All good Linux firewalls are based on this service. |
| ipvsadmin | No | Linux Kernel IP virtual server | This is one of the oldest networking systems in Linux, not used very much any more. |
| irda | No | Infra Red Device Interface | Older wireless device support |
| keytable | Yes | keyboard map | This tells the system exactly which keyboard you are using. |
| kheader | No | Boot Services | This automatically regenerates the kernel header in /boot |
| lads | No | Login Anomaly Detection System | A tool to track login attempts and warn of attempted intrusion. |
| laptop?mode | No | Power Management | A tool to reduce power consumption, extending the life of the laptop battery |
| leafnode | No | NNTP service for X?INETD | |
| lisa | No | LAN information server | |
| lmsensors | No | Hardware health monitor | This requires that the mainboard of the system supports and has monitoring systems in place, such as the CPU temperature and voltage monitors. |
| mailman | No | GNU Mailing List Manager | A commonly used mailing list tool, with a Web interface for administration, written in Python. It allows list members to communicate by sending an email to one address, and replying to the same address. Can also be used to send out newsletters / product updates to those that requested such |
| mandi | No | Interactive Firewall | Special service to allow for temporary wireless access to the system, will open the iptables firewall for current session only access for wireless devices, on user approval only, not automatically. |
| mdadm | No | Monitoring Service for software raid | This also is a management tools for said software raid volumes. |
| mdnsresponder | No | Zeroconf DNS configuration tool | |
| messagebus | Yes | Event monitoring service | This one sends broadcast messages to all users when needed, like the server is going down for reboot. |
| mon | Yes | System Monitoring daemon | A lot of system services require this in order to function |
| mysqld | No | MySQL server | If you don’t need this database, why turn it on? |
| named | No | BIND server | yes, the infamous name server. |
| netplugd | No | Network Card daemon | This service monitors the network interface, turning it off or on depending on signal, used mainly for laptops that may not always be connected. |
| network | Yes | Networking | This turns the network card on, or powers the modem. |
| nfs | No | Network File Share | This enables the clients to access NFS shares, it is required for the client machines in an NFS system. |
| nfsfs | No | The Network File Share Server | This should only be active on the network server |
| nfslock | No | NFS file locking | This should only be active if you are using NFS networking / file share functionality. |
| nifd | No | Howl Client | This provides ipv4 link?local services for zeroconf networks / systems |
| nscd | No | Password and group lookup service | This works for slow protocols like N.I.S/Y.P. nist, ldap and hesiod. It is designed to have a longer timeout specifically for these protocols |
| ntpd | No | Version 4 of the NTP server | |
| numlock | No | number lock light control | This will keep the Numlock activated, turning the keyboard number pad on. |
| oki4daemon | No | compatibility daemon for OKI4 and compatible winprinters | only useful if you have one of these printers |
| pand | No | Bluetooth Personal Area Networking | For home area Bluetooth based networking. |
| partmon | Yes | Partition Monitoring | This service keeps track on free space on mounted partitions. used by most file system browsers for calculating free space on a given partition. |
| pcmcia | No | Personal Computer Memory Card International Association | |
| pg_autovacum | No | PostgreSQL maintenance | This will automatically run the vacuum needed by PostgreSQL to reduce disk space, pulling temp tables from the db as well as deleting temp files created by PostgreSQL. |
| pop3s | No | Secure POP3 server | SSL enabled POP3 server |
| portmap | No | RPC support | Support for those rare apps that use rpc. |
| Postgresql | No | The Postgresql Database Engine | You only need this if you are either running a postgresql db drives application or are developing one. |
| postfix | No | email server | asendmail compatible email server, newer than sendmail itself, becoming more commonly used than sendmail. |
| pptp | No | Shutdown service for ppp | A clean shutdown service for PPP tunnels, used when on ups to avoid lock file problems when power returns to the system. |
| prelude | No | IDS | Intrusion Detection system |
| psacct | No | Process Accounting | A Tracker of active processes, a waste of resources really |
| rawdevices | Yes | Assigns rawdevices to blocks for use | This is needed for DVDS, and oracle DBMS among other things |
| rsync | No | Remote Synchronization | A server to enable remote synchronization of files in a specified directory tree. Commonly used for maintaining mirror sites, can also be used to keep company files current for backup purposes. |
| saned | No | Network Scanner Service | To provide access to your scanner from any workstation in the network. |
| shorwall | Yes | Firewall | A very good IPTables based firewall. |
| smartd | No | Self Monitor Service | For OS access to smart enabled devices, this will allow Linux to tell you if the device is starting to go bad, but relies on the device smart feature for accuracy. |
| smb | No | Samba Network Services | This provides the samba services to enable Windows network compatibility. |
| snmpd | No | Simple Network management Protocol | For use in a small [ home office ] network |
| sound | No | Sound System | This is the core of the Linux sound system, nice for desktops, a waste of resources on a server |
| squid | No | Caching Tool | Used to cache Web pages and DNS entries |
| ssh?xinetd | No | OpenSSH server for x?inetd | a run on demand version of OpenSSH |
| sshd | No | OpenSSH server | Only turn this on if you require SSH access to your system, and are not going to use the x?inetd version. |
| subversion | No | Concurrent Versioning system | New alternative to CVS |
| swat | No | Samba Web Administration Tool | Web based Samba administration |
| syslog | Yes | System Logging | A Required service, it controls all logging on the entire system. |
| tmdns | No | Multicast dns responder | For use in zeroconf environments |
| ultrabayed | No | ThinkPad tool | This detects the presence of the ultrabay for your IBM ThinkPad and starts / stops the IDE interface as appropriate. |
| upsd | No | NUT daemon and drivers | An uninterrupted power supply monitoring and reporting tool. This tool reports to a central site to generate a database on ups statistics. |
| upsmon | No | Monitoring tool for UPS | This will monitor the status of the ups, and shut the system down when it’s running low. |
| vncserver | No | Server for Virtual network computing | Very useful for using VNC in projects. |
| Webmin | No | Remote Administration tool | Distro Agnostic Remote administration tool. Useful for when the machine will not be physically accessible at all times; such as Web server farm. |
| winbind | No | Samba Name Server | Required for samba networking to function. This maps user and group data from the windows network to the Linux workstation |
| wine | No | Wine Is Not an Emulator | This enables running MS Windows executables in Linux. WINE is a limited version of the commercial product Crossover Office. |
| wlan | No | Control Daemon | This Controls services, it is not commonly used as the services are generally controlled through the init process. |
| x?inetd | Yes | Server for monitoring and controlling other servers | This is required service, and it actually reduces CPU load on a server. if you need SSH, ftp, etc but not all the time, the x?inetd version will start them on request, even remote request. This allows for them to be available, but frees the clock?cycles if they are only being used a few times a day / week. |
| xfs | Yes | X Font Server | If you are going to be running a GUI at any point in time, this will be required. |
| ypbind | No | Name Server for Sun’s YP server | This is for GLIBC based NIS / YP networked systems. |