Sorry for delay response since I did some works to test passwd.adjunct.
I know passwd.adjunct is the Sun's solution to hide password encryption.
It's just I'm not sure if it can satisfy what I need.

My goals are,
1. NIS users can login from both Linux and Solaris clients.
2. hide password encryption from ypcat
3. be able to change NIS user passwords from any host in our domain.
4. password aging can be provided to NIS users.

From what I've done, it seems like there is no perfect way to do them all neither using shadow nor passwd.adjunct.

When using shadow,
1. NIS users can login from both Linux and Solaris clients.
2. In order to satisfy #1, "MERGE_PASSWD" in the /var/yp/Makefile has to be set to "true" while it dissatisfies #4. And, this makes ypcat can get pw encrypts.
3. be able to change NIS user passwords from any host in our domain.
4. conflict with #2.

When using passwd.adjunct,
1. NIS users can login from both Linux and Solaris clients.
2. pw encypts can be hid from ypcat.
3. can use yppasswd to change a NIS user pwd. However, it fails to use a NIS user to login NIS master. I' ll describe it later.
4. password aging needs the shadow file instead of passwd.adjunct. I'm not sure if it's right. I failed to test this issue, maybe something I missed.

---------- Post updated at 07:34 PM ---------- Previous update was at 05:50 PM ----------

As for passwd.adjunct, I did some works trying to fit my needs.
To make passwd.adjunct works, there are something need to be done on both server/client.

on the client:
1. Edit /etc/default/nss config and set ADJUNCT_AS_SHADOW=TRUE.

on the server:
1. Create the file /var/yp/securenets

2. check /etc/ypserv.conf for the following settings,

Code:

* : * : shadow.byname : port
* : * : passwd.adjunct.byname : port

3. change /etc/sysconfig/yppasswdd settings,

Code:

PASSWDFILE=/var/yp/passwd
SHADOWFILE=/var/yp/passwd.adjunct

4. set my environment hash variable to DES encryption.
setenv YP_PASSWD_HASH des

5. copy /etc/shadow and /etc/passwd to /var/yp, modify /var/yp/passwd format as below,
username:##username:.....

6. change /var/yp/Makefile setting,

Code:

NOPUSH=false
...
...
MERGE_PASSWD=false
...
...
YPSRCDIR = /etc
YPPWDDIR = /etc
YPPWDDIR_ADJ = /var/yp
YPBINDIR = /usr/lib64/yp
YPSBINDIR = /usr/sbin
YPDIR = /var/yp
YPMAPDIR = $(YPDIR)/$(DOMAIN)
...
GROUP       = $(YPPWDDIR)/group
PASSWD      = $(YPPWDDIR_ADJ)/passwd
SHADOW      = $(YPPWDDIR)/shadow
GSHADOW     = $(YPPWDDIR)/gshadow
ADJUNCT     = $(YPPWDDIR_ADJ)/passwd.adjunct
...
...
# If you don't want some of these maps built, feel free to comment
# them out from this list.

all:  passwd group hosts rpc services netid protocols mail \
        auto.master auto.direct passwd.adjunct

...
ethers:         ethers.byname ethers.byaddr
hosts:          hosts.byname hosts.byaddr
networks:       networks.byaddr networks.byname
protocols:      protocols.bynumber protocols.byname
rpc:            rpc.byname rpc.bynumber
services:       services.byname services.byservicename
passwd:         passwd.byname passwd.byuid
group:          group.byname group.bygid
shadow:         passwd.adjunct
passwd.adjunct: passwd.adjunct.byname
netid:          netid.byname
netgrp:         netgroup netgroup.byhost netgroup.byuser
...

7. After finishing settings, restart ypserv and yppasswdd services.

After those,
1. a NIS user can login from both Linux/Solaris clients.
2. only root can get user password encryption.

3. You can change a NIS user password using yppasswd from any client and re-login. But, it fails to re-login from the NIS master server.

I do more tests and find when I login to the NIS master as a NIS user, it is authenticated to the /etc/shadow instead of /var/yp/passwd.adjunct, and if I use yppasswd to change the user password, it fails to change the NIS passwd.
Then I use passwd to do it again, it succeeds, but only to change /etc/shadow.

I believe it results from the nsswitch.conf setting authentication only to files,

Code:

passwd:     files
shadow:     files
group:      files

So, when I login as a NIS user, it authenticates through /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow.
It's rational settings cause this is NIS master server, and there is no way to set "nis" in front of "files" which will cause the ypserv issue.

From what I tested, this is a gap between /etc/shadow and passwd.adjunct that I don't know how to fix it.

4. Because of #3, I have no chance to test password aging from NIS master. chage/chfn/chsh change /etc/shadow instead of /var/yp/passwd.adjunct.

I'm at my wit's end with this. Does anyone have any idea?