From owner-freebsd-hackers Fri Dec 6 10:58:37 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id EB4C637B401 for ; Fri, 6 Dec 2002 10:58:35 -0800 (PST) Received: from fledge.watson.org (fledge.watson.org [204.156.12.50]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5E5F543ECF for ; Fri, 6 Dec 2002 10:58:35 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from robert@fledge.watson.org) Received: from fledge.watson.org (fledge.pr.watson.org [192.0.2.3]) by fledge.watson.org (8.12.6/8.12.5) with SMTP id gB6IwTBF021582; Fri, 6 Dec 2002 13:58:29 -0500 (EST) (envelope-from robert@fledge.watson.org) Date: Fri, 6 Dec 2002 13:58:29 -0500 (EST) From: Robert Watson X-Sender: robert@fledge.watson.org To: Octavian Hornoiu Cc: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: nsswitch functionality In-Reply-To: <1039195860.3df0ded41aacd@mail.hacknslash.org> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Fri, 6 Dec 2002, Octavian Hornoiu wrote: > I have been doing a lot of research into integrating FreeBSD into my > company's network recently and we have been converting our servers to > FreeBSD gradually but one of the hurdles to overcome is the login issue. > In order to make logins seamless across our network I **MUST** use NT > logins which means I need winbind functionality to work. > > Winbind requires nsswitch to work properly and I know that FreeBSD does > not support it currently but why is this not a top priority at the > moment? I would much rather have nsswitch working than some of the > minor features introduced in 5.0. At least, this is my humble opinion > and I might be asking too much. Is there a dedicated resource working > on nsswitch at the current moment or is the project dead? Right now there is no active work (that I know of) to complete nsswitch. It's something I've wanted to see in place for a long time, but I've had some trouble finding funding to make this happen. Having funding would provide access to a broader array of hands, and always has a good affect on motivation. I can find you a contractor if you can find the money -- otherwise my guess is that the support will gradually trickle in, but that it's something that will take a look longer than either you or I would like. Having nsswitch in place is very important for precisely the reason you identify: it's required to properly integrate with a variet of directory services in use in the enterprise. FWIW, there's no way it will happen for 5.0, because we're already in the release candidate series. However, it could be made to happen within a quarter or two. If anyone is interested in picking up this task unfunded, we can certainly provide the technical information and work with them to make it happen, but it's a non-trivial task. There are some work-arounds, but none of them nearly as pretty as just having nsswitch support :-). One I know of involves redistributing directory service data via NIS. Robert N M Watson FreeBSD Core Team, TrustedBSD Projects robert@fledge.watson.org Network Associates Laboratories To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message