[Samba] Samba 3 + Win2k = Headache

[Shannon Johnson]

The home directories are on the Samba server, not the Windows server.
The Windows clients work fine, but there are all sorts of problems
getting the Linux clients to communicate properly with the Linux server
(go figure). 

Besides, even if I DID have the home directories on the Windows server,
the SMB protocol doesn't support hard or symbolic links, or locking,
which is required for X Windows to work properly... so the users can't
log in and use a GUI. If I try to set up the NFS server on Windows, I
run into username mapping problems, along with other issues. 

(begin rant)
I've been planning and researching this project now for about 3
months... and never had any problems or issues with it, because in all
the websites and books I read, in Samba 3, there's supposed to be a
"unix extensions" option that magically fixes the shortcomings of the
SMB protocol. Now I find out that it doesn't work in the current
version, seemingly doesn't work in the snapshot version, and (possibly)
the only reason it IS working for the developers is that they're
mounting their test directories with CIFS, which supports those things
anyway! In hindsight, maybe I should have scheduled 6 months to research
this... but I figured that since a half-dozen books and websites
verified the existence and purpose of the "unix extensions" option, I
didn't think it necessary. I only have until the end of next week to get
everything working, and I started on this exclusively on Monday... 4
days later, and I'm no closer to being done... and after this is done,
I've got a LOT of other stuff that needs done before next Friday anyway.
(end rant)

Sorry, I just had to get that out. Now, back to my problem...

I can't recompile the kernel to support CIFS as a module (don't know
why... just won't work... I'll give you the IP and root's password if
you'd like to have a go at it), and I can't upgrade to the 2.6 kernel
because I'm using Red Hat Enterprise, which uses a modified version of
the kernel. I've tried everything I can think of, and I'm completely
stumped as to what to do for a solution.

I'm sure most of you have had those situations where you researched
everything you could think of, planned it as best as you could, but when
the time came, all kinds of things went wrong that you couldn't have
possibly foreseen... I'm in that situation now, except now, the boss is
watching VERY closely...

____________________________

Shannon Johnson
Network Support Specialist / Systems Administrator
Dept. of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering
224 Reber Building
University Park, PA 16802
Phone: (814) 865-8267
____________________________
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: tms3 [mailto:tms3 at fsklaw.net]
> Sent: Thursday, May 20, 2004 3:45 PM
> To: Shannon Johnson
> Cc: samba at lists.samba.org
> Subject: Re: [Samba] Samba 3 + Win2k = Headache
> 
> Without knowing the roles of the servers, I can't understand the
> desperation of the problem.  User homes on W2k3, other stuff on
> samba--why is this a problem?
> 
> Shannon Johnson wrote:
> 
> >I have a feeling I may have lost focus on the issue in some of my
> >previous messages... so here's my dilemma.
> >
> >I have several Windows (2000 and XP) clients, and several Linux (Red
Hat
> >Enterprise 3, 2.4.21 kernel) clients. I've got a couple servers, one
is
> >currently Windows 2000 Server, and one is Linux (same as above, with
the
> >snapshot Samba running). I want to be able to have users log into the
> >Linux clients, authenticated through the Windows server, and access
> >their home directory from the Linux server. That's the goal in a
> >nutshell... Here's a very brief summary of the problems I've run into
> >with all of the solutions I've tried:
> >
> >1. I tried having the clients use SMB to mount their home directory,
but
> >realized that SMB doesn't support hard or symbolic links, apparently
> >despite the "unix extensions = yes" option being set. It may be that
the
> >"unix extensions" option only applies to cifs clients, which leads us
to
> >#2.
> >
> >2. I tried to apply the cifs patch to a couple of my Linux client
> >machines, but for one reason or another, the module never wants to
> >either get compiled, or be inserted into the kernel. The kernel gives
me
> >hundreds of errors if I try to compile it, after having downloaded
the
> >source right from Red Hat, in RPM format... even when I copy the
> >/boot/config-2.4.21-15EL to the source directory and try to compile.
> >
> >3. Having lost faith in SMB and CIFS, I moved on to NFS. However,
since
> >my authentication is going through the Windows server via winbind,
each
> >client is getting different UID's and GID's for the same user. So, I
> >tried idmap_ad, after installing the Services for Unix 3.5 on the
> >Windows server, but can't get the clients to pull the UID and GID we
set
> >on the server. It keeps using its own local algorithm and coming up
with
> >its own UID/GID. I've tried removing the winbindd_idmap.tdb and
> >winbindd_cache.tdb, and setting the "idmap backend =
> >ad:ldap://servername" in the smb.conf, but to no avail.
> >
> >4. We're currently considering dropping the Samba server altogether,
> >since nothing we do seems to work, but even that's causing problems.
To
> >get it to work, we have to use NIS for authentication, and access all
> >the home directories via NFS. This all apparently requires much
> >configuration on the Windows server, and is causing me headaches...
> >besides, being an anti-Microsoft guy, I feel like I'm abandoning my
> >brethren in Linuxland.
> >
> >I'm very open to suggestions... I've just about exhausted all the
> >options I can think of... so if anybody has any advice, please let me
> >know.
> >
> >Shannon
> >
> >____________________________
> >
> >Shannon Johnson
> >Network Support Specialist / Systems Administrator
> >Dept. of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering
> >224 Reber Building
> >University Park, PA 16802
> >Phone: (814) 865-8267
> >____________________________
> >
> >
> >
> >
> 
>