[SOLVED] Passwords in configuration files

bucovaina78 · 08-31-2010, 12:18 PM

Lately I adapted my /etc/fstab to mount samba shared network drives. I had to put the password in the configuration file in order to log in automatically. Isn't there another way? It feels a little akward to me to put passwords in a plain text-file ... . I'm not comfortable either with a

Code:

chmod 700 /etc/fstab

I consider Linux being a rather safe OS so there must be a better way

druuna · 08-31-2010, 12:48 PM

Hi,

You need to store the password somewhere, but I do agree that the /etc/fstab file isn't the place to do it. And setting the permissions of that file to 700 will probably have side-effects you don't want.

Have a look at this article: Access Windows Shares from Linux

The user/password is still in a readable file, but one that is dedicated, and it is root's private property.

Hope this helps.

PS: Linux is rather safe, but it is bound to the rules/wishes of the machine it connects to (windows in this case), thus: plain user/password.

suprstar · 08-31-2010, 12:50 PM

You can use a credentials file, put

replace "user=user" with "credentials=/etc/samba/credentials"

In the credentials file put two lines:
username=user
password=password

make the file owned by root and ro by root (sudo chown root.root /etc/samba/credentials && sudo chmod 400 /etc/samba/credentials)