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Before you start
Traditionally, UNIX® and Microsoft® Windows® networks have been in separate worlds: a Windows client could not easily use files on a UNIX server or vice versa. The UNIX world primarily uses NFS (Network File System) to share files. But the NFS protocol is not natively supported by Microsoft Windows, so if you want to access files located on a UNIX server from a Windows machine, you must purchase an NFS driver from a third-party vendor, typically.
Samba bridges the communication gap between UNIX and Microsoft Windows.
This tutorial is the third in a three-part series, designed to demonstrate how to leverage Linux to get the most from your network. With sample code and configuration files, this tutorial describes how to integrate Linux and Windows networks with Samba.
For this tutorial, we'll build upon the network described in Part 1 and Part 2 of this tutorial series, and if you haven't taken either of them, you should before proceeding with this Part 3.
The network described in this tutorial series is intentionally small so that you can easily duplicate the examples on a home or lab network. It's shown in Figure 1. In this tutorial, we use the Samba suite. I recommend that you get a precompiled version (such as RPM) from your Linux vendor's FTP mirror or from samba.org.
Figure 1. The network's layout
This tutorial is intended for readers with moderate UNIX or Linux familiarity and an understanding of basic IP networking concepts.
