Hey Hey,
I do believe that it's time to try and stir some discussion again... so here's my latest discussion topic...
For those of you that have never used Services for Unix before it is quite the impressive Microsoft Product, especially when you consider that it's Free.
Services For Unix 3.5, the latest version of the software was released in January 2004. It is catching so much attention lately that Windows & .Net Magazine used it for the July Top Ten List. Unfortunately to read that article you have to be a Windows & .Net Subscriber. Since pasting it opening in this forum would probably violate copyright laws, I won't do that, however if anyone wants more details on the article they can send me a PM. In the mean time I'll list the points they provided.. just not the descriptions..Quote:
Source: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/sfu...view/sfuwp.asp
This paper provides an introduction to the features and benefits of Windows Services for UNIX 3.5, the award-winning interoperability toolkit from Microsoft. Windows Services for UNIX enables Windows and UNIX clients and servers to share network resources, integrates account management, simplifies cross-platform management, and provides a full UNIX scripting and application execution environment that runs natively on Windows.
10. Telnet is provided (Server and Client) (with NTLM authentication)
9. Unix Shells are provided (Korn and C Shells natively, bash can be downloaded)
8. Unix Command-Line Utilities - More then 350 commands and utils
7. Scriptable Management - MMC Snapin, scriptable management through WMI
6. User Name Mapping - Map Unix Users to Windows Users
5. Interix Unix Application Runtime - Unix Runtime with a full set of APIs
4. Perl 5.6.1 - No explanation needed
3. Password Syncrhonization -- Password Changes between the systems
2. Server for NIS - Store UNIX users, groups and hosts in AD and have them authenticate against AD
1. NFS Support - Client, server and gateway, Unix clients access Windows shares (Server), Windows clients access unix files (client)
You also end up with three noticeable services running... init, inetd and cron. Services that all work similar to the way their UNIX counterparts work.
Now for the discussion... Here's some questions I pose to you.
1. The Telnet server -- does it have any significant security increase over the default Windows telnet server? Why would you make use of this one instead of the one that comes with Windows. Since SFU has an Interix version (unix sources compiled) and a Windows version.. which would be more reliable to use.
2. Does adding NIS and NFS to a Windows environment present any new security risks that an administrator would have to take into account?
3. Is having UNIX user authentication tied into AD a good idea? How about password synchronization over the network even if 3DES encryption is being used for transmission?
4. Is having a full UNIX runtime with a full set of APIs beneficial on a Windows server? is it secure.
As a home user I love this software and I'm currently trying to convince my college that it should be tied into our server/operating system courses. I think it'd be great to setup and tear apart in a lab setting.. I'm just wondering if the Services it provides open the server up more than it should be... SFU 3.5 is still relatively new and doesn't have a lot of documentation... How many sloppy set-ups are there out there... even for the properly done setups.. does anyone know how secure it really is?
LINKS
Services For Unix 3.5 Homepage
Download Services for Unix 3.5
Introduction to Services for Unix 3.5(Word Document)
Features of Services for Unix 3.5
Additional Tools for Services for Unix 3.5 (including the bash shell)
Peace,
HT
PS. If this is new to a lot of people and you'd like a tutorial about the install and setup and what I know about it so far.. how to install additional packages... let me know and I'll start to work on one.