Linux – FreeIPA and AD password synchronisation

There is more to Active Directory than just a bunch of LDAP objects and attributes. Some of the interop protocols are proprietary, many security-sensitive attributes and APIs are locked, are not extensible by any kind of hooks and can only be called by trusted code. Using a different GINA to handle password updates is what is commonly done (tm) in the Windows world if you have any secondary directory to write your password change to.

You might want to look into Novell's eDirectory / NDS and the SSO featureset - it has been pretty much designed with heterogeneous Linux/Windows envoronments in mind.

I don't have a proper solution to backup and restore a FreeIPA server on CentOS, only a workaround to have a server operative with the same configuration in the shortest time possible. You do lose the CA and you need to rejoin the hosts to the server.

This is the way I dealt with "disaster recovery" while using the 2.x series. I did many trial and error experiments and got tired of restoring my settings from scratch:

1. provision a new host using DHCP+PXE+TFTP+Kickstart.
2. ensure the kickstart script installs the puppetlabs repo and register itself with the puppetmaster, there is (was) an entry in autosign.conf for this purpose. (The puppetlabs repo is not mandatory, but I was using syntax not present in the stock version of puppet).
3. write a module containing a package resource to have the server and its dependencies installed, and an exec resource to run a shell script (all kept under version control) defining all the infrastructure needed in the domain.

I'll give you a snippet of the script here, you get the general idea:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# vim:syn=sh:ts=2:fdm=marker
# IPASERVER BOOTSTRAP {{{
# HOSTGROUPS {{{
# foo {{{
ipa hostgroup-add foo --desc='Foo Bar Baz'
ipa hostgroup-add-member sanfernando --hosts={foo,bar,baz}.domain.com
ipa netgroup-add net_foo --nisdomain=domain.com --desc='Foo Bar Baz'
ipa netgroup-add-member net_foo --hostgroups=sanfernando
# }}}
# }}}
# PWPOLICY {{{
ipa pwpolicy-mod global_policy --history=24
ipa pwpolicy-mod global_policy --lockouttime=1200
ipa pwpolicy-mod --setattr=krbpwdmindiffchars=4
ipa pwpolicy-mod --setattr=krbpwdminlenght=14
ipa pwpolicy-mod --setattr=krbpwdmaxfailure=5
ipa pwpolicy-mod --setattr=krbminpwdlife=168
ipa pwpolicy-mod --setattr=krbpwdfailurecountinterval=1200
# }}}
# USERS/GROUPS/HBAC {{{
# developers {{{
ipa user-add jdoe --first='Jane' --last='Doe' --email='jdoe@domain.com' --gecos='Jane Doe' --shell='/bin/rbash' --sshpubkey='AAA......XXGDGHU='
ipa group-add foo --desc='Foo Staff'
ipa group-add-member foo --users=jdoe
ipa hbacrule-add developers_access --desc='Developers access'
ipa hbacrule-add-host developers_access --hostgroups=development
ipa hbacrule-add-user developers_access --groups=developers
ipa hbacrule-add-service developers_access --hbacsvcs=sshd
ipa hbacrule-add-service developers_access --hbacsvcgroups=Sudo
# }}}
# }}}
# SUDO CMD/RULE/GROUP {{{
# networking {{{
ipa sudocmd-add --desc='administration tool for IPv4 packet filtering and NAT' '/sbin/iptables'
ipa sudocmd-add --desc='view and manipulate media-independent interface status' '/sbin/mii-tool'
ipa sudocmd-add --desc='display or change ethernet card settings' '/sbin/ethtool'
ipa sudocmd-add --desc='show and manipulate routing, devices, policy routing and tunnels' '/sbin/ip'
ipa sudocmd-add --desc='sudoedit configuration file of IPv4 packet filtering and NAT' 'sudoedit /etc/sysconfig/iptables'
ipa sudocmdgroup-add networking --desc='commands for network configuration and troubleshooting'
ipa sudocmdgroup-add-member networking --sudocmds=/sbin/{iptables,mii-tool,ethtool,ip}
ipa sudocmdgroup-add-member networking --sudocmds='sudoedit /etc/sysconfig/iptables'
ipa sudorule-add networking_4_operators_2 --desc='Operator Level 2 access to networking management commands'
ipa sudorule-add-allow-command networking_4_operators_2 --sudocmdgroups='networking'
ipa sudorule-add-user networking_4_operators_2 --groups='operators_2'
ipa sudorule-add-host networking_4_operators_2 --hostgroups=foo-hosts
# }}}
# }}}
# }}}