About configuring Access Appliance for CIFS
The Common Internet File System (CIFS), also known as the Server Message Block (SMB), is a network file sharing protocol that is widely used on Microsoft and other operating systems. Access Appliance supports the SMB3 protocol.
Access Appliance supports the following clustering modes:
Normal
Clustered Trivial Database (CTDB) - a cluster implementation of the TDB (Trivial database) based on the Berkeley database API
Note:
In case of network or node failover, the application which performs the I/O operation on the CIFS share needs to have a retry logic for a failed I/O to survive from an I/O failure.
Access Appliance supports the following CIFS security modes:
User
ADS
Each clustering mode supports both of the CIFS security modes.
See About CIFS clustering modes.
Access Appliance can be integrated into a network that consists of machines running Microsoft Windows. You can control and manage the network resources by using Active Directory (AD) domain controllers.
Before you use Access Appliance with CIFS, you must have administrator-level knowledge of the Microsoft operating systems, Microsoft services, and Microsoft protocols (including AD and NT services and protocols).
You can find more information about them at: www.microsoft.com.
When serving the CIFS clients, Access Appliance can be configured to operate in one of the security mode environments described in Table: CIFS security mode environments.
Table: CIFS security mode environments
Mode | Definition |
|---|---|
Standalone | Information about the user and group accounts is stored locally on Access Appliance. Access Appliance also authenticates users locally using the Linux password and group files. This mode of operation is provided for Access Appliance testing and may be appropriate in other cases, for example, when Access Appliance is used in a small network and is not a member of a Windows security domain. In this mode of operation, you must create the local users and groups; they can access the shared resources subject to authorization control. |
Active Directory (AD) | Access Appliance becomes a member of an AD security domain and is configured to use the services of the AD domain controller, such as DNS, LDAP, and NTP. Kerberos, NTLMv2, or NTLM authenticate users. When Access Appliance operates in the AD domain mode, it acts as a domain member server and not as the domain controller. |