I am using Red Hat 9. I have configured samba on my linux boxes and I am able to see the 2003 server. I cannot access the 2003 server any further. Permissions are set on my windows server for my linux group of computers. Both linux and 2003 have the same group, users and passwords. I need to access a share folder on the server, and a share printer connected directly to the server via a parallel port. Can I do this with samba, someone has suggested PAM authentication manager?

First, edit smb.conf:
workgroup = same as the windows box
security = user
hosts allow = 192.168.1. (or 0. or whatever you need) 127.

Second, start Samba server.

Third, try a line like this in your fstab:
//machine name/C /mount/point smbfs (or cifs) username=username,password=password,owner,rw 0 0

Machine name is the name of the windows box (I'm assuming the the entire C drive is shared). /mount/point is the directory you want to mount the windows share to. Username and password are those required to log into the windows box.

The above is a little crude but worked for me (Slackware 12.2). Let us know how you make out.

Thanks Earl for your help. someone told me later that i should also include a line that says
encrypt password = yes
as Active Directory only accepts encrypted passwords and the only other means of doing this step would be to edit the Windows registry to accept clear text passwords (which seemed too be long winded and troublesome). Also by specifying the IP address of the AD server things worked much better.

They were exactly right on encrypt passwords- I missed that one, sorry. Is it working for you?