Samba Config

[Kevin Brown]

Samba is the SMB network file handler for *nix that does what Windows Network
Neighborhood/sharing is for.  When mounting a remote partition with it you
always specify that it is smbfs, not what it actually is because the remote box
is going to interpret your calls for you.

This allows linux to mount remote NTFS partitions because linux isn't seeing it
as NTFS (for which it only has a very buggy read-only module), but as an smbfs
which samba and windows file sharing know how to deal with.

on boxes that you want to remotely mount partitions FROM, you have to have
samba/"windows file sharing" running/enabled.  On the machines that will be
mounting remote systems you should only need the samba client tools.

The easiest way to auto mount a remote file system on boot is NOT /etc/fstab,
but through a boot script, just like is used by other services.

WARNING!! WARNING!! WARNING!!
do NOT issue a shutdown or reboot while a remote smbfs is MOUNTED on your
machine or it WILL HANG.  This is a long standing known issue with samba. 
MANUALLY unmount the smbfs BEFORE you shutdown the machine.  This cannot be done
by a script, it must be done manually.

END WARNING

> OK, I got SWAT up now I'm really confused as to what to do with it.
> Actually I'm very confused as to what to do with getting my Linux
> workstation to be an active part of my network.  I'm not sure what, where or
> even if I need Samba running or for what.  Should it run on the Linux
> server?  The Linux workstation?  The NT server? Nowhere?  None of the books
> I've found are very helpful with this.
> 
> As a review, here is my situation.  I have a RH7.2 workstation, a e-smith
> gateway/server which is running RH7.1 and an NT4.0 server that has my
> printers, scanner and zip drive on.  I can print from the Linux workstation
> with no problem.  I have not tried the scanner or zip yet.  Entering the
> following command from the console I can mount the I-bay on my
> gateway/server to the workstation and access the files in it.
> 
> mount -t smbfs -o username=tom,password=foobar //chow/chow /home/chow
> 
> I have not been able to find a version of this command to put in etc/fstab
> that works to mount it at boot.  I always get smb connection fail errors.
> 
> I have tried similar commands with smbfs, vfat and nfs to mount a share on
> the NT server with various error messages.  mount -t vfat -o
> username=tom,password=foobar /mutt:/d /home/mutt   as an example.  I usually
> get an error that says "special device /mutt does not exist"
> 
> I'm really stumped as to where to go with mounting these two things in
> fstab.  Any help will be greatly appreciated.
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Kevin Brown" <kevin_brown@qwest.net>
> To: <plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
> Sent: Wednesday, January 30, 2002 8:08 PM
> Subject: Re: Samba Config
> 
> I'm assuming RH7.x as your distro.  In this case it might be your firewall
> blocking it or SWAT is not turned on in inetd.conf/xinetd.conf.
> 
> as root:
> 
> /sbin/ipchains -L
> /sbin/iptables -L
> 
> one of those two should spit out your firewall rules.
> 
> /etc/xinetd.d/  <-- holds your configs for inetd controlled processes (like
> SWAT).
> 
> > Tom Achtenberg wrote:
> >
> > When I try to run the Samba Configuration my browser opens then gives me
> an
> > error saying "Could not connect to host 127.0.0.1 port 901"  What should I
> do?
> >
> >
> > Tom Achtenberg
> >
> > Registered Linux User #242974 (See http://counter.li.org
> > Visit my home page at http://achtenberg.com
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