A co worker that uses Windows Vista asked me to setup samba access for
him to a Linux server.
for the life of me, I was not able to figure out how to get windows to
properly authenticate with Samba.
I figured that I might as well just try NFS.
NFS is easy to setup, not many options to fiddle with.
so I setup an nfs export point, and tried to configure a Windows XP
inside VirtualBox to work with it.
first, I download SFU - a 200mb sfx archive from M$, that is supposed to
add UNIX inter-portability to windows.
it turned out to be a real hassle to configure (and documentation is
just bad), and since the co-worker that asked for my help is using Vista
anyway, I figured I might as well look for Vista solutions.
I was pleased to discover that Vista (ultimate, at least) comes with NFS
support which just need to be enabled.
Have M$ finally done something right?
I was able to easily access the export through windows, but was not able
to write anything.
tried provide the user name and password to the mount command (turns out
windows got a mount command, imagine), but it didn't work.
after a bit of research, I found that out that in order for Vista to
send the correct UID/GUI to the NFS server, you need... hold tight:
AN ACTIVE DIRECTORY SERVER.
M$, in it's infinite wisdom, decided that anyone that wants to mount an
NFS server must be on a Windows domain.
the UID/GUI should be added to the user Active directory record.
Since I don't have a windows domain controller here, nor do I have any
intentions of getting one and setting it up, I just can't get it to work
correctly.
in XP, there should be some way to handle it using something called
username mapping, but not anymore.
Vista does it the 'right' way.
Dear MS:
I hate your guts (and your gates).
stop trying to push your incompetent and overly complicated servers and
solutions to users.
why wont you just die?
Endlessly annoyed,
Omry.
