Mount a Windows DFS Namespace in Linux

Question

I've got a Windows DFS setup with a few namespaces, and I need a way of accessing them via CentOS.

Any ideas?

I've had a look at CIFS mounting, but it won't support the namespace (each separate server that hosts the content is fine, but that defeats the point of having the namespace in the first place).

Answer 1

According to http://linux-cifs.samba.org/, the Linux CIFS implementation supports DFS. Make sure you mount with type cifs and not type smbfs. I've successfully configured a dfs namespace using Samba, and then mounted that with CIFS.

In samba.conf:

host msdfs = yes

[iso]
  path = /home/lars/export/iso
  browseable = no
  guest ok = yes
  writable = no

[dfs]
  path = /tmp/dfs
  browseable = no
  guest ok = yes
  writeable = no
  msdfs root = yes

In /tmp/dfs:

ln -s msdfs:\\obliquity\iso iso

And then:

# mount.cifs //obliquity/dfs /mnt -o guest
# ls /mnt
ls: cannot read symbolic link /mnt/iso: Object is remote
foo  iso
# ls /mnt/iso
a-very-import.ISO

Answer 2

If it can't see the DFS namespace but can see the server share, make sure your CentOS box is resolving the address (mydomain.com) correctly.