Re: Windows/Linux network
* curtis (curtis@npc-usa.com) spake thusly:
> I would like to ask people what they think is the best solution for
> networking a windows/linux network.
>
> Keeping in mind that the ultimate goal is to develop a linux only
> network (but that that will not be accomplished anytime soon), I see 2
> options.
>
> 1. Install samba client on all linux user computers and have them
> interact with the Windows network as if a Windows OS.
>
> 2. Install samba server on a single linux server. Map those Windows
> drives that need to be shared out to Linux users to the linux server and
> then remap them to each linux user. Actually, I don't even know if that
> is possible.
>
> Although the first option might be the easiest, keeping in mind that
> eventually there would be no windows computers, it would seem more
> sensible to maintain and support just NFS among the Linux users.
Or you could just google for nfsd for winders.
One major PITA with unix/windows is passwords: you can get unix
to authenticate against Windows PDC with pam (details are somewhere
in samba docs), but that's not what you want when unix is your
primary OS.
Apparently both samba and Linux can use LDAP for auth., but I haven't
tried that yet.
2. should be possible if you can NFS-export filesystems mounted via
samba, but that's really sub-optimal.
Set up a central Linux file server and export filesystems via samba
to windoze machines, and via NFS (or whatever) to linux (you really
want a decent SCSI RAID on that box). You can make it the PDC and
have windows use it for authentication, too. Then have a look at
OpenLDAP for authentication -- that shouldn't be too hard to set up
on Linux. For added bonus, set up an identical server and replicate
everything -- if something goes wrong with the primary, all you need
to do is change backup server's ip address and hostname and things
will be up'n'running again.
Dima
--
The wombat is a mixture of chalk and clay used for respiration. -- MegaHal
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