I am looking into setting up a Samba domain controller using Ubuntu Server, for some Windows XP/7 clients, and I have one important question: Given the importance of DNS in a Microsoft Active Directory infrastructure, why do none of the setup guides mention configuring DNS to support a Samba domain?
I have installed an LDAP/Samba server in a test network that I will be attempting to join using an XP client very soon, but I'm just confused as to how the client will actually "discover" the domain – as I know this is how AD domains work.
I hope someone can shed some light on this!
Best Answer
Samba 3, the current version, does not use the active directory protocols. Instead it uses the older NT4 domain protocols. As Jasper mentioned, this uses NetBIOS for lookups which uses broadcasts. You might want to consider setting up Samba as a WINS server, if you have more than one subnet its a requirement.
If you are using a Samba4 alpha which does use the AD protocols then you will need a DNS server. There are some brave souls that are using Samba4 in production without major issue, it is actually quite stable.