Why is Win98 looking for user "nobody"?

[Tony Ricker]

Steve,
	There is two "nobody" accounts, one in samba and one in linux. The
linux account is needed to run some jobs and what not, the one in samba
is for the guest account. If you have guest = yes or that parameter
under a particular share, this will trigger the nobody account. Also it
is used if a user fails to authenticate (if server is a PDC). I use
samba 2.2.2 on Red Hat 7.1 and I went round and round with this but I
saw the following in my logs due to the fact that I do not use guest
accounts and server is a PDC...

Nov 20 14:21:57 sifl smbd[5132]:   authorise_login: rejected invalid
user nobody 

This plagued me during all hours of the day, every day. I was told by
Red Hat support to leave the linux account alone du to system uses, and
disable (remove) the samba account. Check to see if you want guest and,
if you do, you can map guest = XXX some user you make and just give it a
shell of /bin/false. I hope I am cogent enough so this is understandable
and it helps. Good luck.

Cheers,

Tony

Steve Snyder wrote:
> 
> After posting my original message I noticed that a Win2K client is polling
> the Samba server every 30 minutes.  For each poll, this sequence is logged:
> 
> [2001/11/20 14:23:42, 1] smbd/password.c:pass_check_smb(546)
>   Couldn't find user 'nobody' in passdb.
> [2001/11/20 14:23:42, 1] smbd/password.c:pass_check_smb(546)
>   Couldn't find user 'nobody' in passdb.
> [2001/11/20 14:23:42, 1] smbd/password.c:pass_check_smb(546)
>   Couldn't find user 'nobody' in passdb.
> 
> I assume that the repeated failures increase the CPU load on the server.
> What will satisfy these requests (that is, reduce 3 failed calls to 1
> successful one)?  Adding "nobody" and an smbuser?  Changing the guest
> account to one other than "nobody"
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> On Tuesday 20 November 2001 02:50 pm, Chris Tooley wrote:
> > Read the documentation about the guest account.  This is by default
> > nobody I believe.  Netlogon is reading the configuration as "nobody" is
> > the guest user and it can't find a valid user by that name.  I remember
> > something about guest being used for something during login but can't
> > remember the details.
> >
> > Chris
> >
> > On Tue, 2001-11-20 at 13:43, Steve Snyder wrote:
> > > Below is a transcript of a successful user login (with debug level =
> > > 1). I'd like to ask a question regarding the netlogon notations below.
> > >
> > > First, some background.  My v2.2.2 Samba server is running on a RedHat
> > > Linux v7.2 (with kernel v2.4.14).  The client logon below is from a
> > > Win98SE box.
> > >
> > > The user below, "nancy", is mapping shares in 2 passes.  In the first
> > > pass a number of shares are mapped by a netlogon script when logging
> > > into the network.  In the second pass, the share that nancy has elected
> > > to map, "clipart", is auto-connected by Win98.  So far so good.
> > >
> > > Now what the heck is that business between the 2 sets of connections?
> > > The netlogon is connected to, the user "nobody" is looked for 3 times,
> > > then the netlogon share is closed.  Huh?
> > >
> > > Although user "nobody" exists in Linux, it does not exist in smbpasswd.
> > >  I have no references to this user in either smb.conf or in the logon
> > > script.
> > >
> > > What is causing this sequence of actions and how do I stop it?
> > >
> > > Thanks.
> > >
> > > --------------------------------------
> > >
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:19, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service netlogon as user nancy
> > > (uid=501, gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:22, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service lj4500 as user nancy (uid=501,
> > > gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:22, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service dj1120 as user nancy (uid=501,
> > > gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:22, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service public as user nancy (uid=501,
> > > gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:22, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service shared as user nancy (uid=501,
> > > gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:22, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service nancy as user nancy (uid=501,
> > > gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:23, 1] smbd/service.c:close_cnum(648)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) closed connection to service netlogon
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:23, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service netlogon as user nancy
> > > (uid=501, gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:44, 1] smbd/password.c:pass_check_smb(546)
> > >   Couldn't find user 'nobody' in passdb.
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:44, 1] smbd/password.c:pass_check_smb(546)
> > >   Couldn't find user 'nobody' in passdb.
> > > [2001/11/20 14:10:44, 1] smbd/password.c:pass_check_smb(546)
> > >   Couldn't find user 'nobody' in passdb.
> > > [2001/11/20 14:12:30, 1] smbd/service.c:close_cnum(648)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) closed connection to service netlogon
> > > [2001/11/20 14:21:46, 1] smbd/service.c:make_connection(610)
> > >   venus (192.168.0.3) connect to service clipart as user nancy
> > > (uid=501, gid=100) (pid 30907)
> > >
> > >
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-- 
-------------------------------
Tony Ricker
Technology Coordinator
SLUCare - P.M.O.
St. Louis University
Phone:  314.977.6844
E-mail: rickera2 at slu.edu
-------------------------------
"In the beginners mind, there 
are many possibilities. In the 
experts mind, there are few"
- Shunryu Suzuki
-------------------------------
"Think Different"