Samba file server

Create a quick Samba file share server in Linux

Public + Protected folders
We will start this file server with two folders, each with their own unique function.
The "public" folder will be completely open to all and anyone on the network can read, add, remove, or modify it's contents
The "protected" folder will be visible to all but it's contents cannot be modified.

Installing Samba

Update packages

This is necessary when installing any Linux program

"-y" will automatically accept any prompts

sudo apt-get update -y ✂

Install Samba

sudo apt install samba -y ✂

Open the firewall for Samba

sudo ufw allow samba ✂

Creating the folders, users and groups

Create folders

"-p" will automatically create the parent folder

sudo mkdir -p /share/public ✂

sudo mkdir /share/protected ✂

Create smbgroup

Adds the smbgroup for the smbusers to the system

sudo groupadd --system smbgroup ✂

Create smbuser

No home directory

Members of smbgroup

Cannot log into host system

sudo useradd --system --no-create-home --group smbgroup -s /bin/false smbuser ✂

Make smbuser and smbgroup own the folders

The "-R" flag is for "recursive" which will apply the changes to all child folders

sudo chown -R smbuser:smbgroup /share ✂

Give smbgroup write access to the folders

sudo chmod -R g+w /share ✂

Configuring Samba

Stop Samba

You want to stop the service while making edits to it

sudo systemctl stop smbd ✂

Edit the Samba configuration file

We will back up and rename the original configuration file

We will use nano as the text editor

sudo mv /etc/samba/smb.conf /etc/samba/smb.conf.bak ✂

sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf ✂

Copy this configuration into the text editor and save

Press Ctrl+o then Enter to save in Nano

Press Ctrl+x to escape back to the Terminal

Start Samba

sudo systemctl start smbd ✂

Check if Samba is running

sudo systemctl status smbd ✂

View your hostname

This is your server's name on the network

In Windows it will appear as \\hostname

This command will display your server's hostname

hostname ✂

Connecting to Samba from a Windows client

Enable file sharing in Windows with Powershell

Enable SMB Server/Client feature

Turn on file and printer sharing

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName "SMB1Protocol" -All ✂

Set-NetFirewallRule -DisplayGroup "File And Printer Sharing" -Enabled True -Profile Any ✂

Connect to Samba from Windows

Open the run dialogue in Windows (Windows Key + R)

Run \\hostname

Your hostname may differ, mine is ubuntu-vm

Private folder
The next folder on the file server will be private.
Hidden from public view and only accessible to "user2" with the right credentials.

Create folder and user

Create user for the system

This user will not have a home directory nor login for the system

The user will be named user2

sudo useradd -M -s /usr/sbin/nologin user2 ✂

Create private folder

sudo mkdir /private ✂

Give user2 permissions to folder

sudo chown -R user2:user2 /private ✂

Give user2 write access to the folder

sudo chmod -R g+w /private ✂

Configuring Samba

Stop Samba

sudo systemctl stop smbd ✂

Add user to Samba

You will be prompted to create a password

sudo smbpasswd -a user2 ✂

Edit the Samba configuration file

sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf ✂

Append this to your smb.conf file and save
Start Samba

sudo systemctl start smbd ✂

Connecting to a private directory from Windows

As a private directory, you can only connect to it with the direct address

Run \\hostname\private and enter user2's credentials

Your hostname may differ, mine is ubuntu-vm

You will be prompted for a username and password. Enter your credentials

The private directory appears, with read/write access

It is not visible to other clients

Moving Samba folders to a secondary drive
Generally, the drive with the operating system is not the main data store.
Let's move the Samba folders we made to secondary drives with large storage capacities.

Set permissions to parent folders

Say your drive is mounted at /mnt/4TB and you want your folders to sit in /mnt/4TB/samba_folders,
the folder samba_folders and those leading up to it must have editing permissions for the owner and group and read permissions for all.

Set the permissions for the folders leading up to and including samba_folders to 775

sudo chmod 775 /mnt ✂

sudo chmod 775 /mnt/4TB ✂

sudo chmod 775 /mnt/4TB/samba_folders ✂

Copy the folders to the new destination

The rsync command with "-avz" flags will

a: keep original ownership/permissions

v: verbose output for transfer

z: compress files during transfer

sudo rsync -avz /share/public /mnt/4TB/samba_folders ✂

sudo rsync -avz /share/protected /mnt/4TB/samba_folders ✂

sudo rsync -avz /private /mnt/4TB/samba_folders ✂