All the operating system users and groups listed above are normally assigned to one host. It could however arise depending on demand, that several content server instances on different hosts access the repositories. These repositories do not have to be located on the same host, they may be distributed across several hosts. As well as this, some repositories may be located in the file system and others in one or more database instances.

In cases where operating system users, passwords, and groups have to be synchronized across several hosts, the Network Information Service (NIS) should be used. You must follow the security notes supplied by the respective software providers to set up a secure NIS environment.

To authenticate administration commands, the SAP Content Server can check the received password against an NIS database. The default domain is always used for this. The password is verified against the passwd.byname map and the group.byname map.