Moving from AD to LDAP (Windows to Linux)

[BigBirdy]

I am in the early stages of trying to move a small network (4 servers, 25 WS's) to a non-Active Directory environment. Previously all 4 servers were win2k but 2 are now Linux and eventually the last one (the AD Controller) will also be Linux. The likely distro will be SuSe EL9. I need to plan for a move which will be as seamless as possible for the users but if I MUST create all new accounts, so be it. However, I would prefer to be able to transfer/duplicate all the user accounts in AD, and move them to LDAP, or whatever would be the preferred authentication scheme. Basically I want a unified login for samba shares, email etc so I am pretty sure LDAP is the way to go. If anyone knows of any comprehensive "howtos" I would be greatful. Or, any other suggestions anyone might have. In the end I will still need one single win2k machine running SQL Server, so any suggestions would need to allow for the existence/integration of one remaining win2k machine that I would like to also authenticate to a single system, such as LDAP, assuming this is even possible.

[lordnothing]

just out of curiosity, does it *absolutely* have to be M$'s SQL server?? because for linux/unix you have your choice of MySQL or Postgresql...

[BigBirdy]

yes it does, we already use Oracle on Linux, MySQL and Postgres but we also have two services that currently need SQL Server, at least for now.

[sarumont]

yes it does, we already use Oracle on Linux, MySQL and Postgres but we also have two services that currently need SQL Server, at least for now.

What types of services are these? Is it not a possibility to port them to use mysql or postgre?

[BigBirdy]

No, not possible at all right now. Obviously if this were possible it would have been done by now.

[wassy121]

For the MS SQL server interaction, use FreeTDS (freetds.org). I have had really good luck with my application-level database that I used back a couple years ago. It wasn't huge (17k records, 500 inserts/day, 7500 selects/day), but it was large enough to show that FreeTDS was a mature link even back then in ought-two.

As for the AD->LDAP migration, I tried that as well. There are no good documents on it. The move is painful no matter how you do it. Good luck with that. If you find something worthwhile, or write something worthwhile on how to do it "right", please let us know.

Also, if you want MSSQL support in PHP, you almost definately have to recompile it from the source RPMS. I have built a couple of these for RedHat ES3, but SuSE EL9 just isn't in my repotoire yet. Let me know if you need specific help with this.

Best,

Samuel