Portmapper Protocol

The Portmapper protocol defines a network service that clients use to look up the port number of any remote program supported by the server. The client programs must find the port numbers of the server programs that they intend to use.

The Portmapper program:

• Maps RPC program and version numbers to transport specific port numbers.

• Enables dynamic binding of remote programs. This is desirable because the range of reserved port numbers is small, and the number of potential remote programs is large. When running only the Portmapper program on a reserved port, you can determine the port numbers of other remote programs by querying Portmapper.

• Supports both the UDP and TCP protocols.