Topic: Anyone setup more than 1 e-smith server??

[perc2_raid]

Ok,

So I have to go to a business and make a case for installing 1 or 2 e-smith servers. If two, one would be the firewall/gateway/vpn box. The other would be inside doing dhcp/file/print. My question is: When I create the domain (one e-smith server will act as a win 2k server box and I will join the 2k pro and xp boxes to the e-smith/Windows domain), will I be able to join the other e-smith server to the domain and will users be able to use resources on that second server without needing a user/pass on the second server automatically? Or will I have to hack the Samba file and tell it to authenticate to server= ???

Thanks 2 all.

[Boris]

Samba in the existent stage is not acting as BDC (on e-smith). You will have much less headache using one server for all FW/GW/VPN and file/print services. If you need more file storage or want more servers inside your LAN, any generic Linux Distro with samba only installed and configured to authenticate against you SME server will serve you well. SME is great as a main Small business integrated multipurpose server, but its overkill as samba file/print server only.

[dave]

This probably won't help you but ...

I have 2 SME servers setup, one is my gateway and the other is an internal server only (more for testing than anything else).  To make it work, I set the work group for both to the same name and the gateway box is acting as the domain controller.  I can see the 'domain' name in the windows network neighborhood and both server names in that domain.  Setting users up is a pain though, to let everyone see resources on both boxes, I have to manually create the user lists on both boxes.  This works for me because I have a small network.  As I write this, it occurs to me that I haven't tried to update passwords to the SME domain now that it has 2 servers.  Not sure if that'll work, I'll try it when I get home...

Now I have a question to add to the thread:  
I'm told the term 'Primary Domain Controller' is a Microsoft only designation, is there a way to create the same functionality with SME?  In other words, is there a way to make one SME server box act as a network/domain authentication server?

[Terry Brummell]

Dave, in a nutshell, Yes.

http://edocs.mitel.com/6000_SME_Server/smeserveruserguide/English/admin-setworkgroup.html

[dave]

Thanks Terry, if I'd only spent some more time playing with settings I'd have found this out...  Or if I'd read the manual a bit closer.

I appreciate the response.

[Lennox]

Thanks Boris,

I think you are quite right. I wanted a second e-smith because the administration of it is so easy, but I guess I can use redhat 8 and just run Bastille against it to make sure it is hardened. Plus it is easier to mess around with SAMBA this way and it will allow me to give them a test SQL server.

[Boris]

You are welcome.
Make sure you use preconfigured (professionally) firewall to hide your other (Linux) servers from Internet, at least until you comfortable to configure secure servers yourself. SME is a good choice as it’s already configured to be secure and has host of the nice services, including mySQL server.