rc.samba useless?

jong357 · 04-24-2005, 04:42 PM

Why is this script included? Where does it get called from? rc.inet2 fires up samba if you have a share listed in fstab so rc.samba isn't making much sense to me. I deleted it and my share is getting mounted just fine via rc.inet2...

Any thoughts?

Artimus · 04-24-2005, 05:07 PM

rc.samba is for starting the samba daemon. You're just mounting shares. There is a difference.

Franklin · 04-24-2005, 05:09 PM

Isn't rc.samba for the smbd and nmbd services (samba server) and rc.inet2 for mounting remote smb shares?

Franklin · 04-24-2005, 05:10 PM

I type too damn slow...

jong357 · 04-24-2005, 06:05 PM

O.k... I'm new at using samba. Just started today actually. How can you mount a samba share if the daemon isn't running, which leads me to ask, what is the samba daemon used for then? I'm a little confused... I thought daemons had to be activated in order for a service to be active.... How is samba working then without running the daemon... In other words,

Quote:

There is a difference.

which is?????

freakyg · 04-24-2005, 06:34 PM

Quote:

Where does it get called from?

it does not get called--- you make it executable yourself,
did you take the time to read rc.samba

Code:

#!/bin/sh
#
# /etc/rc.d/rc.samba
#
# Start/stop/restart the Samba SMB file/print server.
#
# To make Samba start automatically at boot, make this
# file executable:  chmod 755 /etc/rc.d/rc.samba
#

samba_start() {
  if [ -x /usr/sbin/smbd -a -x /usr/sbin/nmbd -a -r /etc/samba/smb.conf ]; then
    echo "Starting Samba..."
    /usr/sbin/smbd -D
    /usr/sbin/nmbd -D
  fi
}

samba_stop() {
  killall smbd nmbd
}

samba_restart() {
  samba_stop
  sleep 2
  samba_start
}

case "$1" in
'start')
  samba_start
  ;;
'stop')
  samba_stop
  ;;
'restart')
  samba_restart
  ;;
*)
  # Default is "start", for backwards compatibility with previous
  # Slackware versions.  This may change to a 'usage' error someday.
  samba_start
esac

gbonvehi · 04-24-2005, 06:39 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jong357

Quote:

O.k... I'm new at using samba. Just started today actually. How can you mount a samba share if the daemon isn't running,

Using a samba client, in most cases it's smbmount which mounts a shared directory where you want.

Quote:

which leads me to ask, what is the samba daemon used for then?

It's used to allow you to share something of your machine.

Quote:

I'm a little confused... I thought daemons had to be activated in order for a service to be active.... How is samba working then without running the daemon... In other words,
which is?????

Daemons are as you said services, and the clients access those services

Internet is a very good example, linuxquestions.org is running trough a web daemon (server) and you access it with a web browser (client). You don't need a web server to see this page

shilo · 04-25-2005, 07:10 PM

Quote:

it does not get called--- you make it executable yourself,
did you take the time to read rc.samba

This is just silly.

A) It does not get called? /etc/rc.d/rc.M seems to say otherwise.

B) You make it executable yourself. Well, that is true that if you want to execute the script, the script needs to be executable. You seem to be implying that simply making a script in /etc/rc.d executable will cause it to be executed. This is not true. The executable script must still be called from somewhere.

C) Did he take the time to read the script? It seems irrelevant. The script itself makes no indication of where the script is being called from.

gbonvehi hits the nail on the head. It is the same as not needing Apache running in order to browse the web.

jong357 · 04-30-2005, 05:53 PM

Thanks Shilo... If I was going to post, I was going to rip dude a new asshole. Why do people bother posting if

a) They don't know enough to even give advice on the subject at hand

and

b) insist on being a prick in the process....

I still don't know why one would want to run a Samba server and even what it's used for. Quite frankly I realy couldn't care less at this point. I can read/write to my FAT32 partition and thats all I care about.

gbonvehi, thank you for being helpfull and taking the time to explain.
Shilo, thank you for interjecting and keeping me from being banned with my next reply
freakyg, you can just piss off...

DaWallace · 04-30-2005, 06:09 PM

if you want to run a windows file or print server on your linux box, you run samba.

I'm not gonna blame what's his face for being a prick though.. nothing in that post made any sense and I can only assume that freakyg was on some scary narcotic type thing.

shilo · 04-30-2005, 06:34 PM

Quote:

I still don't know why one would want to run a Samba server and even what it's used for.

Quote:

if you want to run a windows file or print server on your linux box, you run samba.

THis is right. If that doesn't make sense, maybe this will. You can browse Windows shares without a Samba server. If you want to share the other way, i.e. you want to share stuff on your Linux box with Windows boxes, you need to run a Samba server. For files, you can always just set up an FTP, HTTP, or SSH server, but for printers I am not aware of any way to share with Windows boxes without Samba.

It's the same with many things in UNIX. Programs are built on a server/client model. You don't need to run a server to be able to use a client. FTP is a good example. You can use an FTP client without an FTP server of your own. You can also run an FTP server if you want to share files yourself.

DaWallace · 04-30-2005, 06:55 PM

ftp isn't the best example.. unless you use passive ftp, the client actually does act in some ways as a server. but it's the only service I know of that does that.. and for all practical purposes, it is a good example.

jong357 · 04-30-2005, 11:28 PM

Kay.. Making sense. I was wondering how I would browse my linux only laptop in windows. I would need to run the daemons that samba comes with and do some additional setup and reading no doubt. I'm still not sure how running a samba server is going to make windows read a reiserfs partition. Samba must work around that somehow and present a linux partition as something windows can understand? I have to read up on it. I've hardly researched anything up to this point. Just installed it, edited the workgroup in the samba.conf and fiddled with my fstab until it worked... Got lucky I guess....

This is all for my wireless laptop. My desktop dual boots xp/slack. Often times I leave the desktop in windows for playing games. Thats why I decided to get samba running. So I could atleast transfer files over without having to boot the desktop into slack. I would like to use my printer connected to the desktop as well via the laptop so it looks as if I'll try and take it one step further and look into it... I understand it a little better now and that was the reason for this post.... Thanks guys....

shilo · 05-01-2005, 03:38 PM

Quote:

I'm still not sure how running a samba server is going to make windows read a reiserfs partition. Samba must work around that somehow and present a linux partition as something windows can understand?

DaWallace is right about FTP not being a perfect example. It does have some merit, though. Think about this. From Windows you can browse FTP directories. The filesystem and OS of the FTP server doesn't matter. It's the same with SAMBA. Windows will see a Windows share on the Linux box after you get it all set up. Windows doesn't care about the OS or the filesystem. It just sees a Windows share.

All you need to do is edit /etc/samba/smb.conf and add users and passwords. That's the part that gave me the most trouble when I started using SAMBA. The system user/passwords don't apply to SAMBA. What I do in the office is set up the same username/password combinations in SAMBA as I have on the Windows machines.

Quote:

My desktop dual boots xp/slack.

Quote:

I would like to use my printer connected to the desktop as well via the laptop

You may want to set up two printers on your laptop, one for when the desktop is booted to Windows and another for when it is booted to Slackware. Not sure if it's needed, but I think it might be.

jong357 · 05-01-2005, 08:49 PM

Interesting.... Thanks for clarifying. Thats not a bad idea with the printer. That poor desktop hardly ever sees linux anymore but it would still be nice to set up the laptop/printer side. I'll work on it this week. Thanks again...