The Service Access Facility

The Service Access Facility

A port is a physical and symbolic entry point into a computer for either users or processes. In versions of the UNIX^® system before Release 4, local and remote access to ports was controlled through the getty and uugetty processes, respectively. As various vendors added their own networking services to System V, however, they introduced a large number of access methods. The result was inconsistency among interfaces and execution environments. To solve the problems inherent in this variety of access methods, a new interface called the Service Access Facility (SAF) was provided.