[sllug-members]: LDAP? NIS? Weird shell scripts?

[Matthew Hatch]

Hello,

So I'm upgrading an old server running SUSE 9.1 to openSUSE 10.2, and
all is going well, but I do have one question.

In the past, this system has employed NIS and to share passwords and
home directories with a second server we have, and it has worked well
for its purposes.  This system also uses httpd, samba, and exim, all
using their own password methods.  Whenever a user changes a password,
it needs to be changed about five times to make it valid across the system.

I'd like to employ a different method of authentication, where all
services can access a single database to authenticate from.  From what I
understand, LDAP is the best choice for this, though not the easiest to
set up.  NIS isn't capable of sharing passwords with samba and the like.
 I guess i could set up a shell script that would synchronize the
passwords, but it wouldn't be instant whenever one is changed.

My question to you is:  Which methods do you employ, what are your
favorites, and why?  I'd love to delve into LDAP, but it does seem
rather complicated (I'm reading up on it -- O'Reilly books are neat).

Just curious.  I'll get this figured out one way or another, but in the
mean time I'd like some input.  Thanks!

--
Matthew Hatch

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