General Information

Samba shares for groups.

Prerequisites

• Samba server installed and configured
• Samba client installed and configured

The following virtual machines will be used:

• server1.example.com (192.168.1.150) → Perform all SMB client tests from here
• server2.example.com (192.168.1.151) → Install the Samba Server here

Create a group

groupadd smbgrp

Add users to the group

usermod -G smbgrp user1
usermod -G smbgrp user2

Create samba passwords

smbpasswd -a user1
smbpasswd -a user2

Setup the group directory for sharing

mkdir /sambashare_group
chown :smbgrp /sambashare_group
chmod 770 /sambashare_group

SELinux: Set file context

semanage fcontext -at samba_share_t "/sambashare_group(/.*)?"
restorecon -Rv /sambashare_group

Create the new directory share config

vim /etc/samba/smb.conf
 
[sambashare_group]
 comment = My Groups Samba Share
 path = /sambashare_group
 valid users = @smbgrp
 write list = @smbgrp
 writable = yes
 force group = +smbgrp
 create mask = 0664
 directory mask = 0775
 
 # Defaults, but listing in case something in [global] over rides
 browsable = yes
 public = no

• +smbgrp → The “+” means that only users already in the group (smbgrp) will use that as their primary group when accessing the share.

Restart the service for changes to take effect

systemctl restart smb

Ensure the same users and group exist on the client

• uids and gids must match!

List shares

smbclient -L //192.168.1.200 -U user1

Setup local directory for mounting the remote samba share

mkdir /collaborate

Mount Persistently

vim /root/.sharedcreds
 
username=user1
password=password
 
 
vim /etc/fstab
 
//192.168.1.200/smbgroupshare /collaborate  cifs _netdev,rw,credentials=/root/.sharedcreds,uid=1004,gid=1004  0 0