Hello,

i am new to Linux and just want to create a domain in Linux.i guess i have to workout with some ypserver.* files abut i am not sure. any suggestions please...

Thanks in advance


cheers

The term domain is used to mean a number of similar-but-different things, so you'll need to be more specific about what you'd like to accomplish.

NIS is primarily for sharing account details (particularly for use with NFS client-server file sharing). These days NIS is considered both a security problem, and slightly obsolete - LDAP is the now pretty much the standard for maintaining a central list of users/accounts on a network.

Of course
DOMAINNAME="example.com" will point you in the right direction.

I would however heed the advice on LDAP. NIS is fine in your own "domain" if your users are trustworthy, but I wouldn't even consider using it across an open network such as the Internet

That's the security problem - unless you are on a network there all of the users and all of the machines are trusted then NIS/NFS is something to avoid if possible. Since completely trustworthy networks of locked down machines are now so rare (with so many laptops going in and out), it's probably good practice to avoid using this technology altogether.

thanks for your reply,

i want to create a domain in linux as we use to create a domain in windows using active directory system which provides the services of server like user login and etc. is it possible to create such a domain in linux.

cheers

Absolutely.

LDAP gives you a central datastore of accounts (which can be replicated), and you can add Kerberos to provide higher security for the authentication. Active Directory is actually LDAP + Kerberos + Windows File & Print + client management stuff.

If you will be running a network of mixed clients then Samba can provide file and printer access to Windows systems and everything else (OS X, Linux etc.). Other features of the Samba suite enable Windows clients to more smoothly authenticate with standard LDAP/Kerberos servers.

One big difference between Windows and Linux is that on Linux you need to configure each piece to get what you want, whilst Windows installs a very inflexible set of services when you make a server a domain controller.