Windows is asuming you username is what your logged in as.

Sometime you need to "Right click" to say login as another user!

But I just had another thought, win98 sends encrpted password to servers by default! So you have to edit the registry to have window send a plain text password to the samba server. At least that's how we had to do it in the office at raspberymedia.com. I think I copied that howto somewere in the office for future networking tasks. I may be able to dig it up if you are not aware of these win98 issues?

I've heard of them before but never dealt with them before. If you could find that document it would be a huge help! Do you think I need to change anything else in my smb.conf file that may also be a problem?

OK, The computer that document resides on is not on an external network anymore. Sorry, But I will give you the best description as I can remember it:

run Regedit.exe from the start menu.
or Start > Run > type, "regedit" enter.
locate the following key in your registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\VNETSUP

Change the data value for EnablePlainTextPassword to 1.
Reboot your computer.

Don't quote me on this one, I'm just recalling!! If you see nothing about a plain text password then create a new "Dword" with the edit drop down in regedit called "EnablePlainTextPassword" and set the value to "1"
Reboot!!

If it's a no go you may change it back, good luck sorry I could not find it'

I just found something else in a quick google search. This may be easier:

If you are not comfortable with editing the registry directly, we strongly suggest that you use this method, as it will prevent you from making any detrimental changes to your computer’s settings.

1. Insert your Windows 98 CD-ROM into the CD-ROM drive.
2. Go into the :\tools\mtsutil directory of your Windows 98 CD-ROM.
3. Right-click on the Ptxt_on.inf file, and then click Install.
4. Reboot your computer.

werd up'

I tried your last suggestion, but the same problem recurred. I'm going to go pick through the smb.conf file some more and see if I can spot anything I forgot to enable, etc...

Hi bjshaw,

Just a couple of points.

Your computer shows up in network neighbourhood as localhost because that is the default name that Linux gave it. The "netbios name=xxxxx" command gives network neighbourhood another name to use. Note that the command is "netbios name = xxxx" and not "netbios = xxxx"

I don't recommend changing the use of encrypted passwords by Windows. Versions of Windows prior to Win 98 SE used un-encryted passwords. A sniffer could easily read the passwords since they were in plain text. Instead use the "encrypt passwords = yes" command in the smb.conf file.

A common difficulty arises from the use of a firewall. Many users enable the Linux firewall during installation. This will block all packets from the local network. You need to either disable the firewall or configure it to treat eth0 (your network card) as a trusted device.

There are a few posts in the forum about disabling the firewall. You can also type "lokkit" from a command prompt and customize the firewall settings.

Let me know how things work out.

Looks like I have the netbios setup wrong since I used "netbios = xxx" instead of "netbios name = xxx", so I'll fix that. I do have "encrypt passwords = yes" already enabled on the server. I also already setup eth0 as a trusted device. However, let me try the netbios change and get back to you with the result. Thanks!

Okay, now it shows up as "RH8Server" instead of as "LocalHost", but it still requires me to login with a password only, not a username & password. Any suggestions? Would it help if I modified my users on the server to match the computer names of my pc's on my network (it's just me & my wife)? Also, I noticed that my printer isn't showing up....

Cool.

Here is the deal. Passwords can be a bit tricky with Samba. Some of these issues are to be addressed in Samba 3.0 which is currently being developed.

Two password files exist on the Linux machine. One is the Linux password which on Redhat is /etc/passwd. The other is the Samba password which on Redhat is /etc/samba/passwd. (I am assuming that you installed from an RPM or you are using the version of Samba that came with Redhat).

Users need to be added to both password files. Here are some basic commands. It may be a good idea to do some reseach on the useradd and smbpasswd commands. You can specify group membership etc. using the commands.

To create the Linux user type:

useradd bjshaw

To create the Samba user type:

smbpasswd -a bjshaw

If the smbpasswd file doesn't exist you will get an error but it will create it and add the user.

If the Windows and Samba usernames and passwords are the same, you will not have to type an additional password to access the Samba shares.

If the user names are the same but the passwords are different, you will have to type the samba password to gain access to the shares.

How would you disable the firewall? Because I think it's blocking me from using SWAT under RedHat 8.0. I don't even remember what I set it on. I added SWAT to the services file and there is a SWAT file in the xinetd.d folder, but SWAT always says "The connection was refused" when I connect to 127.0.0.1 or meg (the netbios and unix name for the server). Apache works fine on port 80, but when I type in http://meg:901 or http://localhost:901 or even http://127.0.0.1:901 it is refused.
Is the firewall the problem? How do I disable it if it is?

Jamrock, I certainly hope that they will fix that, because the password management is rather awkward right now.

Thanks, JamRock, I'll give that a try. I suspected it might be something along those lines....

This is what I had to do at home. As long as the user exist on both machines it works! On windows2000 you may right click to login as another user.

Try typing "lokkit". This should bring up the firewall configuration tool.

You can also do a search for "Iptables" in the forum. I have seen the instructions for disabling iptables. The firewall is based on iptables.

I have met upon a few work arounds. For example, if you have your Samba server on domain with an existing domain controller you can use

security = domain
password server = xxxxxx

These settings tell Samba to let the domain controller do the authentication. It will ignore the smbpasswd file and accept the password that has been authenticated by the domain conroller (password server).

The only catch here is that the user still needs to exist in the (Linux) passwd file.


There is also a way to automatically add the user to the passwd file if he doesn't exist on the Linux machine but is authenticated by the domain controller. The command needs to be entered under the global section of the smb.conf file.

add user script = useradd %u -c "Account from PDC" -s /bin/false -d /home/%u -m -n -g finance

This says to Samba:

add the user and use the username sent by the domain controller
useradd %u

the user comment is "Account from PDC"
- c "Account from PDC"

don't allow the user to log on locally (i.e. from the samba machine)
-s /bin/false

create a home directory under /home and call it the name of the user
-d /home/%u -m

add the user to the group finance
-n -g finance.

I got the script from the November 2002 edition of SysAdmin magazine in an article written by Arnie Miles. I haven't worked through all the security implications of letting Samba automatically adding users to the Linux machine.

I just have 2 Windows 98SE workstations on a DSL firewall router, along with my Linux server, and a laserprinter. No PDC has been set up.

bjshaw, Have you figured this out yet? I am running Redhat 8, and on my windows 98, and ME computer.... I see my workgroup, Homeshare, and the Windows computer in it... but not the Redhat computer.

From Redhat 8, I can smbmount the windows share, and view it's shared folders... but cannot look at the linux computer from windows?