[archief]
  comment = save stuff here
  path = /path
  guest ok = yes
  writeable = yes
  browseable = yes
  force user = samba
  force group = samba
  create mask = 0660
  force create mode = 0660
  directory mask = 0770
  force directory mode = 0770

The key here is the force modes.

Another issue I had is that the user database got a new backend and all the users were gone. You can import your existing smbpasswd file with pdbedit.

So, when doing this again, be sure to make workstation and server backups.

Samba has an option “veto files” which can be used to stop the creation of that directory. Put this in each share’s section in your smb.conf:

veto files = /*$RECYCLE.BIN/ 

The slashes are not directory separators in this case. Also, I don’t know if the preceeding * is necessary, but it does no harm.

pdbedit has an option to import the old smbpasswd file:

pdbedit -i smbpasswd:/etc/samba/smbpasswd

That should take care of it. I didn’t test it this way though, because I already fiddled with the user database by creating new users by hand. I imported one user with which I still had problems correctly this way, but I don’t know if importing this database from the start would have prevented all my errors.

• Run gpedit.msc.
• Go to computer configuration.
• Go to Administrative templates.
• Go to System.
• Go to User profiles.
• Enable “Set maximum wait time for the network if a user has a roaming user profile or remote home directory” and set to 0 seconds

You’d think that this means it can’t logon, because it suggests the wait period was because of network connection problem. However, I tried adding files to the profile on the server and logged in, and the file was synced to the PC. So, it does seem to work.

While I was at it, I also changed the setting not to allow logons with temporary profiles. It’s in the same list as the option above. In Dutch, it’s “gebruikers niet aanmelden met tijdelijke profielen”.

I also found this about slow logons. It’s for Windows XP, but perhaps it’s useful. It sets “Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon” to true. For some reason, the asynchronous loading of the network caused slowdown for that person.

Finally, I also found people who fixed slow logons by setting the desktop to an image, as opposed to solid color. I tested it, and indeed seemed to influence it.

De opgegeven referenties zijn strijdig met de bestaande groep referenties

In true Windows fashion, this meant that the existing network-drive mappings should be disconnected first…

I included this line in my /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb http://www.backports.org/debian lenny-backports main contrib non-free 

Because backports are disabled by default, I needed to pin all the packages required for samba:

Package: samba
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999
 
Package: smbclient
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999
 
Package: smbfs
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999
 
Package: samba-common
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999
 
Package: samba-common-bin
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999
 
Package: libwbclient0
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999
 
Package: libtalloc2
Pin: release a=lenny-backports
Pin-Priority: 999

I haven’t actually installed it, but I will soon. So I don’t know if it will work or not. Aptitude -s suggests it does.

[Our documents]
  comment = Central storage for all our documents
  path = /home/smb
  guest ok = yes
  writeable = yes
  browseable = yes
  force group = samba
  create mask = 0660
  directory mask = 0770
 
  ; recycler
  vfs object = recycle:recycle
  recycle:subdir_mode = 0770
  recycle:repository = .recycle ; directory name
  recycle:keeptree = Yes
  recycle:touch = Yes
  recycle:versions = No
  recycle:maxsize = 100000000 ; 100 metric million bytes 

The action is hooked on the delete action. Pressing shift-delete won’t prevent files from being moved to the recycler, which is good.

You can then make a cron job which throws away old files:

# Every day at 6am
0 6 * * * root    find /home/smb/.recycle/ -type f -mtime +5 -delete > /dev/null

Mounting FAT works this way as well. But there is a big difference. Where new files on a FAT file system are created according to the permissions you set at mount-time, new files on a SAMBA share have their permissions determined by the umask. However, when you unmount and remount the share, the permissions are changed to what they were set to at mount time.

This is very annoying behavior, because when you have files that belong to root:smbusers and you copy a file, it still belongs to root:smbusers, but when your umask is 0022, it will no longer be group writable and it has become a read only file.

I think this is a bug in the SMBFS/CIFS file system driver.