Network Administration

With Linux UNIT 3 NETWORK CONFIGURATION AND Netw

SETTING
Structure Page Nos.

3.0 Introduction 46
3.1 Objectives 46
3.2 Configuring Networks 46
3.3 Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) 47
3.4 Network Domain System (DNS) 50
3.5 Network File System (NFS) 56
3.6 Web Server 63
3.7 Summary 67
3.8 Answers to Check Your Progress 68
3.9 Further Readings 69

3.0 INTRODUCTION
A computer network is a telecommunications network that allows computers to
exchange data. The physical connection between networked computing devices is
established using either cable media or wireless media. The best-known computer
network is the Internet.

Network configuration is an activity to properly configure any network infrastructure

through which various network applications/services can be run and accessed.
Administrators must be able to configure IP addresses as well as other configuration
files w.r.t different network services such as Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol
(DHCP), Domain Name System (DNS), Email, Web Servers and other such related
network services.

In this unit, you will learn configuration settings of various network services such as
Dynamic Host Protocol (DHCP), Domain Name System (DNS) Network File System
(NFS) and Web Server

3.1 OBJECTIVES
After going through this unit, you will be able to:
• know how to install various network services;
• configure a Dynamic Host Control Protocol;
• understand and configure a Domain Name System; and
• know on how to configure a Samba server.

3.2 CONFIGURING NETWORKS

A computer network facilitates interpersonal communications, allows sharing of files,
and allows sharing of network and computing resources and other such related. To do
so, there is an essential need to configure various network services those facilitate for
46 the above network applications.
ion Network configuration and setup of various services in any organization is a Network Configuration
challenging task to configure various network services such as DHCP, DNS, Web and Setting
Service, Email, etc to run various applications that are to be accessed through
network. The following section explains various core and essential network services
that are to be required in any organization through which various applications can be
run and accessed through an organizational network.

3.3 DYNAMIC HOST CONTROL PROTOCOL

The Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) is a network protocol used to
configure devices that are connected to a network. These devices can communicate
on that network using the Internet Protocol (IP). It involves clients and a server
operating in a client-server model.

Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) automatically assigns IP addresses

and other network configuration information (subnet mask, broadcast address, etc) to
computers on a network. The DHCP server maintains a database of available IP
addresses and configuration information. A client configured for DHCP will send out
a broadcast request to the DHCP server requesting an address. The DHCP server will
then issue a "lease" and assign it to that client. The time period of a valid lease can be
specified on the server. DHCP reduces the amount of time required to configure
clients and allows one to move a computer to various networks and be configured
with the appropriate IP address, gateway and subnet mask.

How DHCP Works?

The following are the activities between DHCP Server and DHCP Client.
• Lease Request: Client broadcasts request to DHCP server with a source address
of 0.0.0.0 and a destination address of 255.255.255.255. The request includes the
MAC address which is used to direct the reply.
• IP lease offer: DHCP server replies with an IP address, subnet mask, network
gateway, name of the domain, name servers, duration of the lease and the IP
address of the DHCP server.
• Lease Selection: Client receives offer and broadcasts to al DHCP servers that will
accept given offer so that other DHCP server need not make an offer.
• The DHCP server then sends an acknowledgement to the client. The client is
configured to use TCP/IP.
• Lease Renewal: When half of the lease time has expired, the client will issue a
new request to the DHCP server.
Download and Install the DHCP Package
Most RedHat and Fedora Linux software product packages are available in the RPM
format, whereas Debian and Ubuntu Linux use DEB format installation files. When
searching for these packages, remember that the filename usually starts with the
software package name and is followed by a version number, for example the file
name as ‘dhcp-3.23.58-4.i386.rpm’.

Managing the DHCP daemon is easy to do, but the procedure differs between Linux
distributions. Here are some things to keep in mind.

• Firstly, different Linux distributions use different daemon management systems.

Each system has its own set of commands to do similar operations.
• Secondly, the daemon name needs to be known and in this case the name of the
daemon is dhcpd. 47
Network Administration dhcpd.conf File Netw
With Linux
You can define your server configuration parameters in the dhcpd.conf file which
may be located in the /etc the /etc/dhcpd or /etc/dhcp3 directories depending on your
version of Linux.

The dhcpd.conf configuration file formats in Debian / Ubuntu and Redhat / Fedora
are identical.
Here is a quick explanation of the dhcpd.conf file.
How do you configure DHCP?
The following is the dhcpd.conf file
ddns-update-style interim
ignore client-updates

subnet 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {

# The range of IP addresses the server

# will issue to DHCP enabled PC clients
# booting up on the network

range 192.168.1.201 192.168.1.220;

# Set the amount of time in seconds that

# a client may keep the IP address

default-lease-time 86400;
max-lease-time 86400;

# Set the default gateway to be used by

# the PC clients

option routers 192.168.1.1;

# Don't forward DHCP requests from this
# NIC interface to any other NIC
# interfaces

option ip-forwarding off;

# Set the broadcast address and subnet mask

# to be used by the DHCP clients

option broadcast-address 192.168.1.255;

option subnet-mask 255.255.255.0;

# Set the NTP server to be used by the

# DHCP clients

option ntp-servers 192.168.1.100;

# Set the DNS server to be used by the

# DHCP clients

option domain-name-servers 192.168.1.100;

48 # If you specify a WINS server for your Windows clients,

ion # you need to include the following option in the dhcpd.conf file: Network Configuration
option netbios-name-servers 192.168.1.100; and Setting

# You can also assign specific IP addresses based on the clients'

# ethernet MAC address as follows (Host's name is "laser-printer":

host laser-printer {
hardware ethernet 08:00:2b:4c:59:23;
fixed-address 192.168.1.222;
}
}
#
# List an unused interface here
#
subnet 192.168.2.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
}

DHCP Servers with Multiple NICs

DHCP servers with multiple interfaces pose two configuration challenges. The first is
setting up the correct routing and the second is making sure only the required
interfaces are listening to serve DHCP.

Routing
When a DHCP configured PC boots, it requests its IP address from the DHCP server.
It does this by sending a standardized DHCP broadcast request packet to the DHCP
server with a source IP address of 255.255.255.255.

If your DHCP server has more than one interface, you have to add a route for this
255.255.255.255 address so that it knows the interface on which to send the reply; if
not, it sends it to the default gateway.

You can temporarily add a route to 255.255.255.255 using the following route add
command:

root# route add -host 255.255.255.255 dev eth0

Create a permanent route to 255.255.255.255. This will vary according to your
version of Linux
In Fedora / RedHat ,add the route to your /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/route-eth0
file, if the route needs to be added to your eth0 interface. The following is an
example:
#
# vi /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/route-eth0 and add the following entry and then
save
#
255.255.255.255/32 dev eth0
in Ubuntu / Debian, add the route to your /etc/network/interfaces file. In this case the
route is added to the eth0 interface. The following is an example:

#
# vi/etc/network/interfaces and add the following and then save
#
iface eth0 inet static
up route add -host 255.255.255.255 eth0 49
Network Administration Listening Netw
With Linux
Once you have defined the interface for your DHCP routing, you should also ensure
that your DHCP server only listens on that interface and no others. This methodology
to do this varies depending on your version of Linux.

In Fedora / RedHat, the /etc/sysconfig/dhcpd file must be edited and the

DHCPDARGS variable edited to include the preferred interface. Fox example
interface eth0 is preferred.

# vi /etc/sysconfig/dhcpd then add the following and save

DHCPDARGS=eth1

In Debian / Ubuntu the /etc/default/dhcp3-server file must be edited and the

INTERFACES variable edited to include the preferred interface. For example
interface eth0 is preferred.

# vi /etc/default/dhcp3-server then add the following and save

INTERFACES="eth0"

You will be able to verify success in one of two ways. First the netstat command
using the –au options will give the list of interfaces listening on the bootp (DHCP)
UDP port. The following is an example:

root# netstat -au | grep bootp

udp 0 0 192.168.1.100:bootps *:*

root#

Secondly, your /var/log/messages file will also reveal the following defined interfaces
used when the DHCPd daemon was restarted.

Jun 8 17:22:44 dhcpd: Listening on LPF/eth0/00:e0:18:5c:d8:41/192.168.1.0/24

Jun 8 17:22:44 dhcpd: Sending on LPF/eth0/00:e0:18:5c:d8:41/192.168.1.0/24

Once, the above messages revealed when DHCPd daemon was started, the
configuration is success then go for launch.

Note: Client systems running on Linux/Windows shall be configured to use DHCP.

3.4 DOMAIN NAME SYSTEM (DNS)

A DNS server, or name server, is used to resolve an IP address to a hostname or vice
versa.

It is a hierarchical distributed naming system for computers, services, or any resource

connected to the internet or a private network. It associates various information with
domain names assigned to each of the participating entities. Most prominently, it
translates easily memorized domain names to the numerical IP addresses needed for
the purpose of locating computer services and devices worldwide.

By setting up a DNS server, you become part of a hierarchy of DNS servers that
make up the internet. At the top of this hierarchy is the root server, represented by a
dot (“.”) below the root server are the top level domains (such as .com,org,and so on).
50
ion Understanding DNS Network Configuration
and Setting
The basic function of name server is to answer queries by providing the information
that those queries request. A DNS name server primarily translates domain and host
names into IP addresses. Each domain is typically represented by a least two DNS
servers. The following are different types of DNS servers:

• Primary (master) name server contains authoritative information about the

domains that it serves. In response to queries for information about its domains,
this server provides that information marked as being authoritative. The primary
is the ultimate source for data about the domain. The secondary name server only
carries the same authority in that it has received and loaded a complete set of
domain information from the primary.

• Secondary (slave) name server gets all information for the domain from the
primary. As is the case for the primary, DNS considers the secondary information
about the domain that it serves authoritative.

• Caching name server simply caches the information it receives about the
locations of hosts and domains. It holds information that it obtains from other
authoritative servers and reuses that information until the information expires.

• Forwarding name server is essentially a caching name server but is useful in

cases where computers lie behind a firewall and in which only one computer can
make DNS queries outside that firewall on behalf of all the internal computers.

Understanding Bind
Red Hat Linux (and most other Linux and UNIX systems) implement DNS services
by using the Berkeley Internet Name Domain (BIND) software. The Internet software
Consortium maintains BIND (at www.isc.org/products/BIND). The basic components
of BIND include the following:

• DNS server daemon (/usr/sbin/named): the named daemon listens on a port for
DNS services requests and then fulfills those requests based on information in the
configuration files that you create. Mostly named receives requests to resolve the
host names in your domain to IP address.

• DNS configuration files (named.conf and /var/named/ *): the/etc/named.conf file

is where you add most of the general configuration information that you need to
define the DNS services for your domain. Separate files in the /var/named
directory contain specific zone information.

• DNS lookup tools to check that your DNS server is resolving host names
properly. These include commands such as host, dig, and nslookup (which are
part of the bind-utils software package).

To maintain your DNS server correctly, you can also perform the following
configuration tasks with your DNS server:

Logging indicates what you want to log and where log files reside.)

Remote server options can set options for specific DNS servers to perform such
tasks as blocking information from a bad server, setting encryption keys to you use
with a server, or defining transfer methods)

There is no need to give out DNS information to everyone who requests it. Restrict
access to those who request it based on the following.
51
Network Administration Access control list can contain those hosts, domains or IP addresses that one wants Netw
With Linux
to group together and apply the same level of access to DNS server. C acl records to
group those addresses, and then indicate what domain information the locations in
that acl can or can’t access.

Listen-on ports by default, name server accepts only name server requests that come
to port 53 on name server. You can add more port numbers if you want your name
server to accept name-service queries on different ports.

Authentication is to verify the identities of hosts that are requesting services from
DNS server, can use keys for authentication and authorization. (the key and trusted-
keys statements are used for authentication.)

Quick-starting A DNS Server

The DNS server software that comes with the current Red Had Linux is Berkeley
Internet name Daemon (BIND). The following components are required to configure
BIND.

• Configuration file (/etc/named.conf) is the main DNS server configuration file.

• Zone directory (/var/named) is the directory containing files that keep

information about the zone that you create for your DNS server.

• Daemon process (/usr/sbin/named ) is the daemon process that listens for DNS
requests and responds with information that the named.conf file presents.

• Debugging tools (named –checkconf, and named-checkzone) are to determine

whetherthe created DNS configuration correctly.

The following are the points one has to keep it in mind in creating a DNS server:
• identifying your DNS servers
• creating DNS configuration files (named.conf and /var/names/*)
• starting the named daemon
• Monitoring named activities

Configure DNS Server

The following is a step by step procedure to configure a master DNS server.

For this activity, use three systems- one Linux server, second Linux clients and third
window clients.

Step 1 - bind and caching-nameserver rpm is required to configure DNS. Check them
for install, if not found then install

52
ion
Network Configuration
and Setting

Step 2 - set hostname to server.example.com and ip address to 192.168.0.254

Main configuration file for dns server is named.conf. By default, this file is not
created in /var/named/chroot/etc/ directory. Instead of named.conf , a sample file
/var/named/chroot/etc/named.caching-nameserver.conf is created. This file is used to
make a caching only name server. You can also do editing in this file after changing
its name to named.conf to configure master dns server or you can manually create a
new named.conf file.

In our example, create a new named.conf file

Or do editing exactly as shown here in image

53
Network Administration save this file with :wq and exit Netw
With Linux
Configure zone file

Defined two zone files example.com.zone for forward zone and 0.168.192.in-
addr.arpa for reverse zone. These files will be stored in /var/named/chroot/var/named/
location.

Use two sample files for creating these files.

By default this file will look like this

Change this file exactly as shown in image below

Now open reverse lookup zone file 0.168.192.in-addr.arpa

54
ion By default it will look like this Network Configuration
and Setting

Change this file exactly as shown in image below

Now changed the ownership of these zone files to named group

Now start the named service

If service restart without any error, it means successfully configured master name
server.

Check Your Progress 1

1. Discuss the activities between DHCP Server and DHCP Client.

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………
55
Network Administration 2. What are the different types of DNS servers? Explain. Netw
With Linux
…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

3.5 NETWORK FILE SYSTEM

Network File System (NFS) is a server-client protocol for sharing files between
computers on a common network. It allows a computer to access directories on
remote computers by mounting them on a local file system as if they were a local disk
The administrator on the NFS server has to define the directories that need to be
activated, or exported, for access by the NFS clients, and administrators on the clients
need to define both the NFS server and the subset of its exported directories to use. It
is available on a variety of UNIX based operating systems, not just Linux. The server
and client do not have to use the same operating system. The client system just needs
to be ruining an NFS client compatible with the NFS server.

General rules to be followed

One should follow some general rules when configuring NFS.
• Only export directories beneath the / directory.
• Do not export a subdirectory of a directory that has already been exported. The
exception being when the subdirectory is on a different physical device.
Likewise, do not export the parent of a subdirectory unless it is on a separate
device.
• Only export local filesystems.

When mounting any filesystem on a directory, one should know that the original
contents of the directory are ignored, or obscured, in favor of the files in the
mounted filesystem. When the filesystem is unmounted, then the original files in
the directory reappear unchanged.

Some NFS key concepts

The following are some key NFS background concepts that will help in overall
understanding.

The Virtual File System (VFS)

VFS interface is the mechanism used by NFS to redirect all access to NFS-mounted
files to the remote server. It is done in such a way that files on the remote NFS server
appear to the user like those on a local disk.

Stateless Operation
Programs that read and write to files on a local filesystem rely on the operating
system to track their access location within the file with a pointer. As NFS is a
network-based file system, and networks can be unreliable, it was decided that the
NFS client daemon would act as a failsafe intermediary between regular programs
running on the NFS client and the NFS server.
56
ion Normally, when a server fails, file accesses timeout and the file pointers are reset to Network Configuration
zero. With NFS, the NFS server doesn't maintain the file pointer information, the and Setting
NFS client does. This means that if an NFS server suddenly fails, the NFS client can
precisely restart the file access once more after patiently waiting until the server
returns online.

Caching
NFS clients typically request more data than they need and cache the results in
memory locally so that further sequential access of the data can be done locally
instead of access from server. This is also known as a read ahead cache. Caching
therefore helps to reduce the amount of network traffic while simultaneously
improving the speed of some types of data access. The NFS server caches information
too, such as the directory information for the most recently accessed files and a read
ahead cache for recently read files.

NFS and Symbolic links

One has to be careful with the use of symbolic links on exported NFS directories. If
an absolute link points to a directory on the NFS server that hasn't been exported,
then the NFS client won't be able to access it. Mounting a filesystem on a symbolic
link actually mounts the filesystem on the target of the symbolic link. Plan carefully
before doing this.

NFS Background mounting

NFS clients use remote procedure call (RPC) suite of network application helper
programs to mount remote filesystems. If the mount cannot occur during the default
RPC timeout period, then the client retries the mount process until the NFS number of
retires has been exceeded. The default is 10,000 minutes, which is approximately a
week. The difficulty here is that if the NFS server is unavailable, the mount command
will hang for a week until it returns online.

Hard and Soft mounts

The process of continuous retrying, whether in the background or foreground, is
called a hard mount. NFS attempts to guarantee the consistency of data with these
constant retries. With soft mounts, repeated RPC failures cause the NFS operation to
fail not hang and data consistency is therefore not guaranteed. The advantage is that
the operation completes quickly, whether it fails or not. In such case it is better not to
place critical data that needs to be updated regularly or executable programs in such a
location. NFS has currently various versions such as version 2,3 and 4. Version 1 was
a prototype.

NFS Daemons
NFS isn't a single program, but a suite of interrelated programs that work together to
get the job done. The following are several daemons that are started when a system
goes into run level 3 or multi-user mode. The mountd and nfsd daemons are run on
systems that are servers. The automatic startup of the server daemons depends on the
existence of entries that are labeled with the NFS file-system type in /etc/dfs/sharetab.
To support NFS file locking, the lockd and statd daemons are run on NFS clients and
servers.

i) automountd Daemon
This daemon handles the mounting and unmounting requests from the autofs
service. The syntax of the command is as follows:

automountd [ -Tnv ] [ -D name=value ]

The command behaves in the following ways: 57
Network Administration -T enables tracing. Netw
With Linux
-n disables browsing on all autofs nodes.
-v selects to log all status messages to the console.
-D name=value substitutes value for the automount map variable that is
indicated by name.
The default value for the automount map is /etc/auto_master. Use the -T option
for troubleshooting

ii) lockd Daemon

This daemon supports record-locking operations on NFS files. The lockd daemon
manages RPC connections between the client and the server for the Network
Lock Manager (NLM) protocol.

iii) mountd Daemon

This daemon handles file-system mount requests from remote systems and
provides access control. The mountd daemon checks /etc/dfs/sharetab to
determine which file systems are available for remote mounting and which
systems are allowed to do the remote mounting. One can use the -v option and the
-r option with this command.

The -v option runs the command in verbose mode. Every time an NFS server
determines the access that a client should be granted, a message is printed on the
console. The information that is generated can be useful when trying to determine
why a client cannot access a file system.

The -r option rejects all future mount requests from clients. This option does not
affect clients that already have a file system mounted.

iv) nfs4cbd Daemon

This daemon is for the exclusive use of the NFS version 4 client that manages the
communication endpoints for the NFS version 4 callback program. The daemon
has no user-accessible interface.

v) nfslogd Daemon
This daemon provides operational logging. NFS operations that are logged
against a server are based on the configuration options that are defined in
/etc/default/nfslogd. When NFS server logging is enabled, records of all RPC
operations on a selected file system are written to a buffer file by the kernel

vi) statd Daemon

This daemon works with lockd daemon to provide crash and recovery functions
for the lock manager. The statd daemon tracks the clients that hold locks on an
NFS server. If a server crashes, on rebooting, statd daemon on the server contacts
statd on the client. The client statd can then attempt to reclaim any locks on the
server. The client statd also informs the server statd when a client has crashed so
that the client's locks on the server can be cleared.

vii) rpcbind: (portmap in older versions of Linux)

The primary daemon upon which all the others rely, rpcbind manages
connections for applications that use the RPC specification. By default, rpcbind
listens to TCP port 111 on which an initial connection is made. This is then used
to negotiate a range of TCP ports, usually above port 1024, to be used for
58 subsequent data transfers. You need to run rpcbind on both the NFS server and
client.
ion viii) nfs Network Configuration
and Setting
Starts the RPC processes needed to serve shared NFS file systems. The nfs
daemon needs to be run on the NFS server only.

ix) nfslock
Used to allow NFS clients to lock files on the server via RPC processes. The
nfslock daemon needs to be run on both the NFS server and client.

x) netfs
It allows RPC processes run on NFS clients to mount NFS filesystems on the
server. The netfs daemon needs to be run on the NFS client only.

Installing NFS

RedHat Linux installs nfs by default, and nfs is also activated when the system boots.
One can check whether nfs installed or not using the RPM command in conjunction
with the grep command to search for all installed nfs packages.

The following is an example to check:

[root# rpm -qa | grep nfs

redhat-config-nfs-1.1.3-1
nfs-utils-1.0.1-3.9
[root#
A blank list means that there is a need to install the required packages.

There is also a need to have the RPC rpcbind package installed, and the rpm
command can tell whether it is installed or not. Use rpm in conjunction with grep, to
check all the rpcbind applications installed or not.

The following is an example:

[root# rpm -q rpcbind
rpcbind-4.0-57
[root#
A blank list means that there is a need to install the required packages.

If nfs and rpcbind are not installed, they can be added fairly easily once find the nfs-
utils and rpcbind RPMs. Remember that RPM filenames usually start with the
software's name and a version number, as in nfs-utils-1.1.3-1.i386.rpm.

A Typical NFS Scenario

A small office has an old Linux server that is running out of disk space. The office
cannot tolerate any down time, even after hours, because the server is accessed by
overseas programmers and clients at nights and local ones by day. Budgets are tight
and the company needs a quick solution until it can get a purchase order approved for
a hardware upgrade. Another Linux server on the network has additional disk
capacity (for ex. at /data partition) and the office would like to expand into it as an
interim expansion NFS server.

59
Network Administration Configuring NFS on The Server Netw
With Linux
Both the NFS server and NFS client have to have parts of the NFS package installed
and running. The server needs rpcbind, nfs, and nfslock operational, as well as a
correctly configured /etc/exports file.

The following explains how exports file is to be configured:

The /etc/exports File

The /etc/exports file is the main NFS configuration file, and it consists of two
columns. The first column lists the directories you want to make available to the
network. The second column has two parts. The first part lists the networks or DNS
domains that can get access to the directory, and the second part lists NFS options in
brackets.

For example for the scenario as mentioned above, suppose requires the following:
Read-only access to the /data/files directory to all networks
Read/write access to the /home directory from all servers on the xxx.xxx.1.0 /24
network, which is all addresses from xxx.xxx.1.0 to xxx.xxx.1.255
Read/write access to the /data/test directory from servers in the my-site.com DNS
domain
Read/write access to the /data/database directory from a single server xxx.xxx.1.203.
In all cases, use the sync option to ensure that file data cached in memory is
automatically written to the disk after the completion of any disk data copying
operation.
#/etc/exports
/data/files *(ro,sync)
/home xxx.xxx.1.0/24(rw,sync)
/data/test *.my-site.com(rw,sync)
/data/database xxx.xxx.1.203/32(rw,sync)
After configuring /etc/exports file, there is a need to activate the settings, but first
make sure that NFS is running correctly.

Starting NFS on the Server

Configuring an NFS server is straightforward:
Use the chkconfig command to configure the required nfs and RPC rpcbind daemons
to start at boot and also activate NFS file locking to reduce the risk of corrupted data.

The following is the example:

root@# chkconfig nfs on

root@# chkconfig nfslock on
root@# chkconfig rpcbind on
Use the init scripts in the /etc/init.d directory to start the nfs and RPC rpcbind
daemons.

The following are examples to use the start option, but by using stop and restart
options one can stop or restart the service as when needed.

60
ion root# service rpcbind start Network Configuration
and Setting
root# service nfs start
root# service nfslock start

root# service rpcbind stop

root# service rpcbind restart

Test whether NFS is running correctly with the rpcinfo command or not. The
following I an example to list the running RPC programs.

root# rpcinfo -p localhost

program vers proto port
100000 2 tcp 111 portmapper
100000 2 udp 111 portmapper
100003 2 udp 2049 nfs
100003 3 udp 2049 nfs
100021 1 udp 1024 nlockmgr
100021 3 udp 1024 nlockmgr
100021 4 udp 1024 nlockmgr
100005 1 udp 1042 mountd
100005 1 tcp 2342 mountd
100005 2 udp 1042 mountd
100005 2 tcp 2342 mountd
100005 3 udp 1042 mountd
100005 3 tcp 2342 mountd
root#

Accessing NFS Server Directories from the Client

In most cases, users want their NFS directories to be permanently mounted. This
requires an entry in the /etc/fstab file in addition to the creation of the mount point
directory.

The /etc/fstab File

The /etc/fstab file lists all the partitions that need to be auto-mounted when the system
boots. Edit the /etc/fstab file for NFS directory to be made permanently available to
users on the NFS.

For example, mount the /data/files directory on server test(IP address xxx.xxx.1.100)
as NFS-type filesystem using the local /mnt/nfs mount point directory.

#/etc/fstab

#Directory Mount Point Type Options Dump FSCK

xxx.xxx.1.100:/data/files /mnt/nfs nfs soft,nfsvers=2 0 0

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Network Administration This example is used the soft and nfsvers options; The table 1 outlines these and other Netw
With Linux
useful NFS mounting options:

Table 1: NFS Option

Option Description

bg Retry mounting in the background if mounting initially fails

fg Mount in the foreground

soft Use soft mounting

hard Use hard mounting

rsize=n The amount of data NFS will attempt to access per read operation. The
default is dependent on the kernel. For NFS version 2, set it to 8192 to
assure maximum throughput.

wsize=n The amount of data NFS will attempt to access per write operation. The
default is dependent on the kernel. For NFS version 2, set it to 8192 to
assure maximum throughput.

nfsvers=n The version of NFS the mount command should attempt to use

tcp Attempt to mount the filesystem using TCP packets: the default is UDP.

intr If the filesystem is hard mounted and the mount times out, allow for the
process to be aborted using the usual methods such as CTRL-C and the
kill command.

Configuring NFS on the Client

NFS configuration on the client requires to start the NFS application; create a
directory on which to mount the NFS server's directories that are exported via the
/etc/exports file, and finally to mount the NFS server's directory on local system’s
directory, or mount point.

Starting NFS on the Client

Use the following steps to configure NFS on the client.
Use the chkconfig command to configure the required nfs and RPC rpcbind daemons
to start at boot. Activate nfslock to lock the files and reduce the risk of corrupted data.

root# chkconfig netfs on

root# chkconfig nfslock on
root# chkconfig rpcbind on
Use the init scripts in the /etc/init.d directory to start the nfs and RPC rpcbind
daemons. Use the following example les to start, stop and restart the processes:

root# service rpcbind start

62 root# service netfs start
ion root# service nfslock start Network Configuration
and Setting
root# service rpcbind stop
root# service rpcbind restart

Test NFS whether is running correctly or not with the rpcinfo command. The
flowing is an examplw:
.
root# rpcinfo -p
program vers proto port
100000 2 tcp 111 portmapper
100000 2 udp 111 portmapper
100024 1 udp 32768 status
100024 1 tcp 32768 status
100021 1 udp 32769 nlockmgr
100021 3 udp 32769 nlockmgr
100021 4 udp 32769 nlockmgr
100021 1 tcp 32769 nlockmgr
100021 3 tcp 32769 nlockmgr
100021 4 tcp 32769 nlockmgr
391002 2 tcp 32770 sgi_fam
root#

3.6 WEB SERVER

The primary function of a web server is to cater web page to the request of clients
using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). This means delivery of HTML
documents and any additional content that may be included by a document, such as
images, style sheets and scripts. The server that sends your web browser the code to
display a web page is called a web server. There are countless web servers all over
the Internet serving countless websites to people all over the world. Whether you
need a web server to host a website on the Internet a Red Hat Enterprise Linux server
can function as a web server using the Apache HTTP server. The Apache HTTP
server is a popular, open source server application that runs on many UNIX-based
systems as well as Microsoft Windows.

A user agent, commonly a web browser initiates communication by making a request

for a specific resource using HTTP and the server responds with the content of that
resource or displays an error message, if not available. The resource is typically a real
file on the server's secondary storage, but this is not necessarily the case and depends
on how the web server is implemented.

Samba Server
Samba is a software package that comes with Red Hat Linux to share file systems and
printers on a network with computers that use the session massage block (SMS)
protocol. SMB is the protocol that is delivered with windows operating systems for
sharing files and printers. In Red Hat Linux, the Samba software package contains a
variety of daemon processes, administrative tools, user tools, and configuration files.
63
Network Administration The default Samba configuration file is smb.conf, which is in /etc/samba directory ( Netw
With Linux
/etc/samba/smb.conf). If you need to access features that are not available through the
samba server configuration file you can edit /etc/samba/smb.conf file as required.

Daemon processes consist of smbd (the SMB daemon) and nmbd ( the NetBIOS
name server ). The smbd is what makes the file sharing and printing services you add
to your Red Hat Linux computer available to windows client computers. The
following are some of the clients that Samba supports:

Window 9X
Window 2000
Window NT
Window ME
Window XP
Window for workgroups
Ms Client 3.0 for DOS
OS/2
Dave for Macintosh computer
Samba for Linux

As for administrative tools for samba, you have several shell commands at your
disposal. You can check your configuration file using the testparm and testprns
commands. The smbstatus command tells you which computers are currently
connected to your shared

Samba configuration file (smb.conf)

# smb.conf is the main Samba configuration file. You find a full commented
# version at /usr/share/doc/packages/samba/examples/smb.conf.SUSE if the
# samba-doc package is installed.
# Date: 2008-05-28
[global]
workgroup = WORKGROUP
printing = cups
printcap name = cups
printcap cache time = 750
cups options = raw
map to guest = Bad User
include = /etc/samba/dhcp.conf
logon path = \\%L\profiles\.msprofile
logon home = \\%L\%U\.9xprofile
logon drive = P:
usershare allow guests = Yes
add machine script = /usr/sbin/useradd -c Machine -d /var/lib/nobody -s /bin/false
%m$
domain logons = No
domain master = No
security = user
usershare max shares = 100
[homes]
comment = Home Directories
valid users = %S, %D%w%S
browseable = No
64 read only = No
inherit acls = Yes
ion [profiles] Network Configuration
comment = Network Profiles Service and Setting
path = %H
read only = No
store dos attributes = Yes
create mask = 0600
directory mask = 0700
[users]
comment = All users
path = /home
read only = No
inherit acls = Yes
veto files = /aquota.user/groups/shares/
[groups]
comment = All groups
path = /home/groups
read only = No
inherit acls = Yes
[printers]
comment = All Printers
path = /var/tmp
printable = Yes
create mask = 0600
browseable = No
[print$]
comment = Printer Drivers
path = /var/lib/samba/drivers
write list = @ntadmin root
force group = ntadmin
create mask = 0664
directory mask = 0775

## Share disabled by YaST

# [netlogon]

[public]
comment = RAID drive share
inherit acls = Yes
path = /local/public
read only = No

How to configure Samba server

The following is the step by step procedure to configure a Samba Server
1. Server IP address is xxx.xxx.0.254 and machine name is Server1
2. Windows machine IP address is xxx.xxx.0.2 and machine name is client2
3. Firewall Should be disabled.

#chkconfig iptables off

#service iptables stop
#chkconfig ip6tables off
#service ip6tables stop

65
Network Administration 4. To check if all rpms required for samba are installed or not. Netw
With Linux
#rpm –qa | grep samba, then it displays the following
Samba-<version-name>
Samba-common-<version-name>
Samba-client-<version- name>
System-config-samba-<version-name>

5. If not, install it using

#rpm –ivh samba

6. Copy the original configuration file as smb.conf.bck

#cp /etc/samba/smb.conf /etc/samba.conf.bck

(This will keep a backup copy of your configuration file.)

7. Now edit the configuration file

#vi /etc/samba/smb.conf

8. To share home directory edit this part of /etc/samba/smb.conf

[homes]
comment=Home directories
browseable =no
writable=yes

9.To share printer edit this part of /etc/samba/smb.conf

[printers]
comment = All printers
path = /var/spool/samba
browseable = no

10.To configure share called IHNCSHARE edit this part of /etc/samba/smb.conf

[IHNC’s share]
comment = Testing Samba Server
path = /samba
valid users = user1, user2

11. Save the file with wq command

12. To check your configuration file type testparm

#testparm

13. Create two samba users user1 and user2

useradd user1
useradd user2

14. Create smbpassword for both the users

smbpasswd –a user1
smbpasswd –a user2

66
ion 15. Now you stop/start the samba services Network Configuration
and Setting
#service smb stop
#service smb start

16. To see what is shared from your server through samba for a particular user

#smbclient -L Server1 –U user1 or smbclient –L //xxx.xxx.0.1 –U user1

17. To see what is shared for a particular host

#smbclient –L mac2

18. Now, permanently make samba server on

#chkconfig smb on

Check Your Progress 2

1. List the components required to configure BIND.

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

2. What is Samba Server? Explain its importance.

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………

3.7 SUMMARY
In this unit, installation, configuration and setup of various network services such as
Dynamic Host Control Protocol (DHCP), Domain Name System (DNS), Network
File System (NFS) and Samba server are explained in detail with examples. This
knowledge nay help to understand the concepts and install, configure and
commissioning of other network services such as Email, FTP and such related
services also. Student has to practice in real time to have more exposure and built
confidence in configuration of network services. 67
Network Administration
With Linux 3.8 ANSWERS TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS Netw

Check Your Progress 1

1. The following are the activities between DHCP Server and DHCP Client.

• Lease Request: Client broadcasts request to DHCP server with a source

address of 0.0.0.0 and a destination address of 255.255.255.255. The
request includes the MAC address which is used to direct the reply.

• IP lease offer: DHCP server replies with an IP address, subnet mask,

network gateway, name of the domain, name servers, duration of the lease
and the IP address of the DHCP server.

• Lease Selection: Client receives offer and broadcasts to al DHCP servers

that will accept given offer so that other DHCP server need not make an
offer.

• The DHCP server then sends an acknowledgement to the client. The client
is configured to use TCP/IP.

• Lease Renewal: When half of the lease time has expired, the client will
issue a new request to the DHCP server.

2. The following are different types of DNS servers:

Primary (master) name server contains authoritative information about the

domains that it serves. In response to queries for information about its domains,
this server provides that information marked as being authoritative. The
primary is the ultimate source for data about the domain. The secondary name
server only carries the same authority in that it has received and loaded a
complete set of domain information from the primary.

Secondary (slave) name server gets all information for the domain from the
primary. As is the case for the primary, DNS considers the secondary
information about the domain that it serves authoritative.

Caching name server simply caches the information it receives about the
locations of hosts and domains. It holds information that it obtains from other
authoritative servers and reuses that information until the information expires.

Forwarding name server is essentially a caching name server but is useful in

cases where computers lie behind a firewall and in which only one computer
can make DNS queries outside that firewall on behalf of all the internal
computers.

Check Your Progress 2

1. The following components are required to configure BIND.

Configuration file (/etc/named.conf) is the main DNS server configuration file.

Zone directory (/var/named) is the directory containing files that keep

information about the zone that you create for your DNS server.

Daemon process (/usr/sbin/named ) is the daemon process that listens for DNS
requests and responds with information that the named.conf file presents.
68
ion
Network Configuration
and Setting
Debugging tools (named –checkconf, and named-checkzone) are to determine
whetherthe created DNS configuration correctly.

2. Samba is a software package that comes with Red Hat Linux to share file systems
and printers on a network with computers that use the session massage block
(SMS) protocol. SMB is the protocol that is delivered with windows operating
systems for sharing files and printers. In Red Hat Linux, the Samba software
package contains a variety of daemon processes, administrative tools, user tools,
and configuration files.

The default Samba configuration file is smb.conf, which is in /etc/samba

directory ( /etc/samba/smb.conf). If you need to access features that are not
available through the samba server configuration file you can edit
/etc/samba/smb.conf file as required.

3.9 FURTHER READINGS

1. Computer Networks by Andrew S Tanenbaum , Fifth Edition
2. SA2, Redhat System Administration I & II, Student Workbook
3. Cisco Certified Network Associate Study Guide, Seventh Edition by Todd
Lammle
4. Redhat Enterprise Linux System Administration
5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dhcp
6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dns
7. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/nfs

69