Samba Recap

Samba is the Linux tool to allow sharing files and printers with Windows boxes across a network. We’ve looked this week at configuring Samba to use SWAT, at setting up shares, and at the smbclient command line program. All in all, Samba can make life on a heterogeneous network much easier to manage.

It seems like a good time, at the end of this series, to do a bit of housecleaning on items not covered. Three elements of Samba we didn’t discuss are smbmount, smbpasswd and Samba’s support for encrypted passwords. While these are essential to gaining the most from Samba, the discussion is deeper than time or space will allow in Penguin Shell. A great jumping-off point for further understanding of these issues is the Samba home page. You’ll find links to mailing lists and documentation aplenty. For the sake of using SWAT, we’ve also left out a discussion on hard-coding the configuration via the smb.conf file. Thorough discussions of all these elements, including first-hand solutions, are available freely on the web.

All in all, if you’re currently administering a network that includes Windows boxes, or expect to do so either at work or at home, Samba is the best possible remedy to most interoperability headaches.