I have been looking into this as well.  NIS works in a way that you can
basically store half your passwd/shadow/group files on one central
server.  Sort of an NFS for single files.  I am still looking into LDAP
as an option.  The only thing that I don't like about the Linux
authentication options is the fact that unlike windows it typical
applications don't maintain the authentication, s every time you start a
web browser you have to re-authenticate with any servers there.  It
makes for a difficult use experience for the non techies.

Bill W

On Tue, 2002-10-08 at 09:35, Scott H wrote:
> One of the first issues faced by any admin who
> wants to convert from a MS network to Linux is
> authentication.  In the MS world, there are NT4
> domains, and the more recent Win2K Active
> Directory domain, which provide a central
> authentication db for all activities on the
> network.  If I understand correctly, the most
> similar thing in the nix world is the NIS domain.
>  But there is also the possibility of setting up
> an LDAP server for authentication.  Let me throw
> out my comments and questions, and please comment
> and/or correct me:  
> 
> 1) there are no other realistic options besides
> the above 2 for centralized authentication for
> users
> 
> 2) LDAP is preferable to NIS, because it offers
> everything NIS does, as well as (from
> http://diradmin.open-it.org/index.php):
> 
>     * Like NIS, a single source of sign-on: using
> LDAP, eliminating different sources and making
> user administration much easier. LDAP integrates
> with the PAM security architecture and many
> servers such as Apache.
>     * Mail accounts without system accounts: you
> can create user accounts for several mail servers
> without necessarily creating a system account for
> them.
>     * Centralized preference storage: you may
> want to centralize preferences for different
> applications. For example, Netscape preferences,
> bookmarks etc can be stored in LDAP.
>     * Corporate address book: most e-mail
> software allows you to use LDAP directory servers
> as address book sources, so you keep your company
> members' information there. You can also link
> your directory to specialized software such as
> trouble tracking, and make your users log in to
> the software.
> 
> 
> 3) both NIS and LDAP can use encrypted &
> public/private key authentication techniques,
> including kerberos, so no passwords need to
> traverse the network in clear text.
> 
> How does all this sound?
> 
> Scott (was "boyhowdy")
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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Bill Warner
Unix/Linux Admin.
Direct Alliance Corporation

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