How to enable the Name Service cache Daemon (NSCD)

By enabling the Name Service cache Daemon (NSCD) of the operating system, a significant performance improvement can be achieved when using naming services like DNS, NIS, NIS+, LDAP.

Benefit of name service cache daemon (NSCD) for ClearCase
Example:

WithoutNSCD:

[user@host]$ time cleartool co -nc "/var/tmp/file"
Checked out "/var/tmp/file" from version "/main/10".
real    0m3.355s
user    0m0.020s
sys     0m0.018s

With NSCD

[user@host]$ time cleartool co -nc "/var/tmp/file"
Checked out "/var/tmp/file" from version "/main/11".
real    0m0.556s
user    0m0.021s
sys     0m0.016s
Enabling NSCD

Solaris:

/etc/init.d/nscd start

Linux

service nscd start

AIX:

startsrc -s netcd

Note: In addition to having nscd started it is mandatory to be sure this service will be started after a reboot. For instance on Red Hat and SuSE you can run:

chkconfig nscd  on

For more details on how to configure and or enable NSCD refer to your respective operating system vendor's manpage.