I have recently had to do a clean install of 12.3 and want to use my old SAMBA configuration files from 12.2.
Can I simply drop a copy of my old configuration files into /etc/samba and start the service?
Yes you can, but the workstation name must be changed if included. I have a bash script you can use for all things Samba in a peer-2-peer setup you can read here: S.A.C.T. - Samba Automated Configuration Tool - Version 1.06 - Blogs - openSUSE Forums and I suggest you read the blog text from top to bottom before you proceed.
Thank You,
This will be the SAMBA server. The config I had is what I want and I really don’t understand how it all works or how I even got it working originally.
There was lots I simply didn’t understand.
The hostname of the Linux machine serving the files is the same. It’s all read only. The Windows machines do not write to the Linux machine ever and I don’t want them too.
I’ll see what I can see by just doing it.
Seemed to work.
I set a start at boot SAMBA session up in YAST
stopped smbd from the CLI
deleted the files in /etc/samba/ and copied my old files over.
Then started smbd.
My Linux box’s files appeared to the Windows machine that needs in in Windows Explorer’s network listing.
So first, if you have found a working solution, that is all that matters. I do wonder though why you might not wish to be more informed on how Samba works and to take free advice that includes such effort as my bash script SACT? You can move towards understanding how Samba works or randomly obtain a working setup after hours and hours of trials and tribulations. It is always a user choice to do so, of course.
Thank You,
James it’s mostly because I don’t want to have the ability to configure all kinds of stuff I don’t need or have to configure things I don’t want to have enabled. I don’t want to have to install software or scripts. I want to have a text file that can be edited with kwrite and call it good. You have to know more about the windows world than I want to know. All I need is a way to share multimedia files to a windows machine.
That is all. No printer sharing or ability to allow the Windows machine to write to the Linux machine.
NFS dies what I want simply on Linux. SAMBA is not simple like setting NFS shares up from YAST
You have to know more about the windows world than I want to know.
Thanks for your help and interest.
For some reason you think that using a bash script is more difficult to use, but that could not be farther from the truth. Take the simple request to edit your /etc/samba/smb.conf file with kwrite. Its as simple as one-two-three:
http://paste.opensuse.org/view/download/28277858
Select the SACT icon from your desktop (or KDE Applications menu), select option 3 to edit your smb.conf file and edit the file in kwrite as normal and save. To get the bash script all you need to do is open up a terminal session and copy the following command, paste it into terminal and press enter:
rm ~/bin/sact ; wget -nc http://paste.opensuse.org/view/download/32414090 -O ~/bin/sact ; chmod +x ~/bin/sact
And for the first time run, in the same terminal session you type in:
sact
During the first run, you will be asked for permission to create the icons which you can use henceforth to startup SACT. Then, you have the power of understanding for Samba at your finger tips.
Thank You,
I’m curious abut your use of “max protocol” when the advisory in smb.conf says that
Normally this option should not be set as the automatic negotiation phase in the SMB protocol takes care of choosing the appropriate protocol.
and at this time they say also that:
…The Samba implementation of SMB2 is currently marked experimental!
Thanks James
As an avid kernel supporter and always using the very latest version, support was added for SMB2 in kernel 3.8 and even before. So to that end, I decided to give it at try myself. There are many hits for SMB2 on the Internet that you can find, but with support in Windows 8 and of course the ability to use it among Linux versions using the latest kernel, I have decided to give it a try myself.
Here is one link: http://www.samba.org/~sfrench/presentations/smf-linux-collab-summmit-future-of-file-protocols-smb2.2.pdf
Thank You,
Interesting document, particularly regarding some of the comments made about NFS. (I hope NFS continues to develop to eliminate some of its inherent weaknesses mentioned there.)
On 5/12/2013 7:06 PM, jdmcdaniel3 wrote:
>
> swerdna;2556343 Wrote:
>> I’m curious abut your use of “max protocol” when the advisory in
>> smb.conf says that
>>
>>
>> and at this time they say also that:
>>
>> Thanks James
>
> As an avid kernel supporter and always using the very latest version,
> support was added for SMB2 in kernel 3.8 and even before. So to that
> end, I decided to give it at try myself. There are many hits for SMB2
> on the Internet that you can find, but with support in Windows 8 and of
> course the ability to use it among Linux versions using the latest
> kernel, I have decided to give it a try myself.
>
> Here is one link: http://tinyurl.com/d423rd9
>
> Thank You,
>
>
I’ve been using “max protocol = smb2” since Samba version 3.6.2 or 3.6.3. Smb2 was suppose to be ready with Samba 3.6. But,
there were some bug in the early versions of 3.6, particularly with MS Office. The bugs seem to be straighten out now. I have not
carefully checked, however there seems to be improved performance.
–
P.V.
“We’re all in this together, I’m pulling for you” Red Green
On 5/12/2013 8:47 PM, PV wrote:
<snip>
>>
>>
> I’ve been using “max protocol = smb2” since Samba version 3.6.2 or 3.6.3. Smb2 was suppose to be ready with Samba 3.6. But,
> there were some bug in the early versions of 3.6, particularly with MS Office. The bugs seem to be straighten out now. I have not
> carefully checked, however there seems to be improved performance.
>
I forgot to cite the release notes for Samba 3.6.0. See:
http://www.samba.org/samba/history/samba-3.6.0.html
–
P.V.
“We’re all in this together, I’m pulling for you” Red Green
And this was the best part to see there:
SMB2 support
SMB2 support in 3.6.0 is fully functional (with one omission),
and can be enabled by setting:
max protocol = SMB2
in the [global] section of your smb.conf and re-starting
Samba. All features should work over SMB2 except the modification
of user quotas using the Windows quota management tools.
As this is the first release containing what we consider
to be a fully featured SMB2 protocol, we are not enabling
this by default, but encourage users to enable SMB2 and
test it. Once we have enough confirmation from Samba
users and OEMs that SMB2 support is stable in wide user
testing we will enable SMB2 by default in a future Samba
release.
And we are at Samba “3.6.12” in openSUSE 12.3 at the moment.
Thank You,
On 5/12/2013 9:16 PM, jdmcdaniel3 wrote:
>
<snip>
>
> And we are at Samba “3.6.12” in openSUSE 12.3 at the moment.
>
> Thank You,
>
>
The current version of Samba3 is 3.6.15. It is in the repositories here:
http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/network:/samba:/STABLE/
–
P.V.
“We’re all in this together, I’m pulling for you” Red Green
I’m well “behind the eight-ball”, I connect to our remote file servers at work, but I’m still on openSUSE 12.2, with samba 3.6.7 
On 5/12/2013 5:26 PM, swerdna wrote:
>
> I’m curious abut your use of “max protocol” when the advisory in
> smb.conf says that
>> Normally this option should not be set as the automatic negotiation
>> phase in the SMB protocol takes care of choosing the appropriate
>> protocol.
>
> and at this time they say also that:> …The Samba implementation of SMB2 is currently marked
>> experimental!
>
> Thanks James
>
I believe that the purpose of that comment in man smb.conf was to warn people about setting a lower value then the default. The
default value of “max protocol” is still NT1. To allow the server to negotiate up to smb2, you must increase the protocol to smb2.
AFAIK XP does not understand smb2 and will negotiate up to NT1. Windows 7 will negotiate up to smb2, if this is set for the max
protocol. It seems that they never increased the default to smb2.
–
P.V.
“We’re all in this together, I’m pulling for you” Red Green
Thanks James.
Do you think the Sun will set on NFS as it rises for SMB2?
Thanks Paul. So with my 12.3 & 3.6.12 I will enable it.
Well at present, you just have two choices and really we don’t want to be stuck with just one. On the other hand, the thought that using Samba should only be done in a mixed setup of Windows and Linux machines is Bulletin Sheet. You should use what best suites your needs and Samba is looking pretty good with the addition of SMB2 support.
Thank You,