Not running a server, but it always seems like I am.

[Motorik]

I just discovered directory utility today while troubleshooting some problems with my perpetually non functioning macbook, and while it is probably normal, i was wondering if anyone could explain to me what some of these are?

When i look under directory editor, it says viewing: Users in node /Local/Default, and lists 78 users. I am sure most are system files, but many seem odd, as I am not running any type of server program, this is a home laptop that has not been used as a server, nor as a client (maybe years ago at school, or an old office job, but many fresh installs since).

I also have all sharing turned off, no antivirus (Clamxav is showing up here, have a disk image of it in my dropbox from some old mac installations which is synced locally, but not installed, and has never been installed on the current 10.9 installation, which was done not 3 weeks ago. A google on another user, AMaViS Daemon, got me worried, as it claimed it was a antivirus which I haven't ever downloaded to my memory.)

 

[burne]

I just discovered directory utility

No clue what that is, but I gather you found /etc/passwd's list of system users. If you think amavis sounds scary, wait until you google what Kerberos is, or Dovecot.

However, it is a list of pseudo users. They might be used if you install the right software on your mac, or, for other daemons, start them.

Unless you want to become an UNIX engineer, just ignore it. The 'real' users on your machine are listed in /Users, and what is running on your machine you can check with Activity Monitor. Don't start digging around in the details of the UNIX subsystem. Not without a good backup and time to reinstall your machine.

 

[chris.k]

These are all normal.

The users for all the server services are always predefined in OSX. They have no impact on your system. They're there (as jailed users/sandboxed for security) just In case you ever install Server.app in the future.

They are not "running" and the programs are not installed on your system.

You can never login as these users. There are no running programs/processes running which are running under those UIDs.

You're looking "under the hood" pretty deep here by investigating the local LDAP database. Lots of nifty information is in there!

clamd and amavisd are used for checking emails for viruses if you turn on postfix. (SMTP mail server). They are not "user space" virus checkers in the classical term. Ie they aren't watching what's running on your OS. They only specifically watch incoming Emails destined for the local mail relay process in Server.app.