Samba (software) - Features

Features

Samba allows file and print sharing between computers running Windows and computers running Unix. It is an implementation of dozens of services and a dozen protocols, including:

  • The NetBIOS over TCP/IP (NBT)
  • SMB
  • CIFS (an enhanced version of SMB)
  • DCE/RPC or more specifically, MSRPC, the Network Neighborhood suite of protocols
  • A WINS server also known as a NetBIOS Name Server (NBNS)
  • The NT Domain suite of protocols which includes NT Domain Logons
  • Secure Accounts Manager (SAM) database
  • Local Security Authority (LSA) service
  • NT-style printing service (SPOOLSS), NTLM and more recently Active Directory Logon which involves a modified version of Kerberos and a modified version of LDAP.

All these services and protocols are frequently incorrectly referred to as just NetBIOS or SMB. The NetBIOS and WINS protocols are deprecated on Windows.

Samba sets up network shares for chosen Unix directories (including all contained subdirectories). These appear to Microsoft Windows users as normal Windows folders accessible via the network. Unix users can either mount the shares directly as part of their file structure using the smbmount command or, alternatively, can use a utility, smbclient (libsmb) installed with Samba to read the shares with a similar interface to a standard command line FTP program. Each directory can have different access privileges overlaid on top of the normal Unix file protections. For example: home directories would have read/write access for all known users, allowing each to access their own files. However they would still not have access to the files of others unless that permission would normally exist. Note that the netlogon share, typically distributed as a read only share from /etc/samba/netlogon, is the logon directory for user logon scripts.

Samba services are implemented as two daemons:

  • smbd, which provides the file and printer sharing services, and
  • nmbd, which provides the NetBIOS-to-IP-address name service. NetBIOS over TCP/IP requires some method for mapping NetBIOS computer names to the IP addresses of a TCP/IP network.

Samba configuration is achieved by editing a single file (typically installed as /etc/smb.conf or /etc/samba/smb.conf). Samba can also provide user logon scripts and group policy implementation through poledit.

Samba is included in most Linux distributions and is started during the boot process. On Red Hat, for instance, the /etc/rc.d/init.d/smb script runs at boot time, and starts both daemons. Samba is not included in Solaris 8, but a Solaris 8-compatible version is available from the Samba website.

Samba includes a web administration tool called Samba Web Administration Tool (SWAT).

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