Using Samba, Second Edition

What Can Samba Do?

Now let’s wrap up by showing where Samba can help out and where it is limited. Table 1-9 summarizes which roles Samba can and cannot play in a Windows NT or Active Directory domain or a Windows workgroup. Many of the Windows domain protocols are proprietary and have not been documented by Microsoft and therefore must be reverse-engineered by the Samba team before Samba can support them. As of Version 3.0, Samba cannot act as a backup in most roles and does not yet fully support Active Directory.

Table 1-9. Samba roles (as of Version 3.0)

Role	Can perform?
File server	Yes
Printer server	Yes
Microsoft Dfs server	Yes
Primary domain controller	Yes
Backup domain controller	No
Active Directory domain controller	No
Windows 95/98/Me authentication	Yes
Windows NT/2000/XP authentication	Yes
Local master browser	Yes
Local backup browser	Yes
Domain master browser	Yes
Primary WINS server	Yes
Secondary WINS server	No