Samba 4: Linux Active Directory

19 January 2009 by Gunthy
Filed under Linux + Software

Over at Computerworld, there’s a very interesting article about the new version of Samba. For the first time, there is a real alternative for Microsoft Active Directory on Linux. While the FOSS world already has a certain amount of Directory Servers like Apache Directory Server, Fedora Directory Server, OpenDS and others, none of them have ever really been able to provide an alternative for AD.

According to its developers, Samba 4 is about to change all this. While it is true that there is still a long way to go, some nice things are to be expected. As previous versions required tedious configuration skills and reading through tons of manuals, version 4 should “just work”.  The DNS scheme is now being generated automatically, and the OpenLDAP back-end, if required, is being configured by Samba itself. Scripting has vastly improved, as now Python is being used as the default scripting language, however there are still bindings for other tools as well.

All good news, but there are of course a couple of disadvantages. For example, there is no real administration interface. In the past, Samba used to have a web-interface, but due to lack of support this has been removed. The door has of course been left open for the community to develop this, so I think we will see quite a few of these interfaces pop up soon enough. Another downside is that authentication for Unix clients and the print server, compared to Samba 3,  are not yet implemented. In it’s current state this would mean you’d have to run the two versions side by side.  Luckily, there seem to be plans to re-instate these features as soon as possible.

Of course there is still a lot of work to do. One of the things mentioned are domain trusts not yet implemented. This is still a bit of a set-back. However the fact that the Samba-team is working closely together with Microsoft is proving to be successful. Unfortunately, Samba 4 is not yet released to the public, but an alpha release is due soon. So for all you early-adopters out there, just a little more patience .

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