How to Network Red Hat Linux and Microsoft Windows
Last updated: 9/7/02

4. The Samba Web Administartion Tool (SWAT) is very useful for configuring Samba Users, modifying the Samba configuration file, and just about anything else that can be modified and maintained in Samba.  SWAT is accessed with a web browser and consists of html pages.  All of the Samba documentation is conveniently available from the SWAT home page. A Status display allows monitoring Samba and can even be used to shut-it-down or start-it-up manually.  Samba does not have to be running to use SWAT.

The Samba RPM I used also installed SWAT.  Some of them do not include SWAT.  In those cases, SWAT is also available and can be installed as a separate RPM.  The RH 7.3 distirbution does not include SWAT.

5.  After Installing the RPM, you will find Samba and SWAT as separate entries in the RH Service Configuration.  Samba should start if you have a valid smb.conf file, but SWAT may not.  SWAT requires that either the xidentd (Extended Identification Protocol) or the identd (Identification Protocol) daemon is running and that a valid SWAT configuration file is present for xidentd or configuration lines are present in a couple of files for identd.  The identd configuration lines are not present in the default RH or after the RPM installation.  xidentd is newer, preferred, and after the RPM installation has a SWAT configuration file: /etc/xident.d/swat.  However, there is a bug in the internal tcpwrappers functionality of xinetd and the supplied configuration file will not work without modification.  Per the Red Hat "gotchas" (I don't personally like software with gotchas like these, and especially after they are still gotchas two years later--but, whacha want fur nut'n, anway?) one should use an editor such as qedit to change the following line:

only_from = localhost

to..

only_from = 127.0.0.1

I went a step further.  This is what my /etc/xident.d/swat file looks like:

I simply commented-out the offending line with a # and removed the restriction.  This allows access to SWAT from any computer on our LAN by entering http://linux:901/ in a browser Address box.

6.  After saving the file make sure xidentd, Samba, and SWAT are started, the checkboxes are checked in Service Configuration, and the configuration is saved so they will start automatically during bootup.

There are many other possible Samba configurations.  I leave you at this point to explore them now that you have SWAT as a tool with which to do so...

Larry