samba - Mar 2007 - Samba PDC - upgrading from winxp clients to linux (OpenSUSE) clients

Hello,

I do volunteer work for a local non-profit business. I've
built several computers for them, set up their network, etc...
A few years ago I set up a Samba PDC server for them with
Windows XP clients. The current setup works fine. The Windows
clients store their profiles and documents on the server in
the corresponding home directory and locally (on the client)
so that if the server is down for some reason (hasn't happened
yet), they still have access to their documents. They also
have a shared directory on the server for storing shared
documents. Backups are done periodically on the server of the
home directories and the shared directory using a script,
crontab and re-writable DVD's.

Recently I donated an older computer to them for use by their
maintenance department for internet only (not for logging on
to the domain).  This computer has OpenSUSE 10.2 installed on
it. The Director tried out the computer and wants to "upgrade"
all but one of their networked desktops to OpenSUSE 10.2.

At home, I've set up a test PDC and test desktop to log on to
the PDC with OpenSUSE 10.2. However, the home directory on the
client computer is only stored locally on the client
(/home/domain_name/user_name), NOT on the server as well. It's
important that the existing home directories on the server
"sync up" with the new Linux desktops and that the profiles
are stored locally and on the server.

My question is this: How do I set up the OpenSUSE clients to
have the same behavior as the Windows XP clients. They need to
store their profiles both locally on the client and on the
server in the existing users home directory. Authentication
for the existing PDC is smbpasswd.

Any help with this matter would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance!

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On 03/11/2007 12:51 PM, Lake-Wind wrote:
[...]
> My question is this: How do I set up the OpenSUSE clients to
> have the same behavior as the Windows XP clients. They need to
> store their profiles both locally on the client and on the
> server in the existing users home directory. Authentication
> for the existing PDC is smbpasswd.
	My first idea would be: NFS. If it is not possible, you
should try pam_mount, you would be able to mount the home once
the logon happens and that should solve the problem.

	The real problem will come up if you need to have a HOT
copy of local $HOME and $SERVERHOME, that could be tricky to
implement and you would probably need to use a distributed file
system, but I'm not really sure what would be the best solution
in that case.

> Any help with this matter would be greatly appreciated.
> Thank you in advance!
	Kind regards,

- --
Felipe Augusto van de Wiel <felipe@paranacidade.org.br>
Coordenadoria de Tecnologia da Informa??o (CTI) - SEDU/PARANACIDADE
http://www.paranacidade.org.br/           Phone: (+55 41 3350 3300)
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