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I am currently managing a network of workstations running different flavours of Ubuntu. The server (also Ubuntu) runs a NIS server and exports a shared /home directory over NFS (in v3 compatibility mode). Workstations are configured to mount server:/home to /home using static fstab entries. Users can log-in from any workstation to their account while their /home/xxx directory is always accessible (Quite old-school).

The problem (one out of many of course) with the current setup is, users can see the whole /home. If users are not careful with file permissions in their home directories, their data can be accessed by other users.

I need advice on how to improve/upgrade the system, preferably with minimal change to the current setup.

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  • This is how linux was designed and would be the case regardless of nis/nfs involvement. If it is a problem mount, /home/userdir to /home/userdir on the machines. If you want roaming profiles switch to a windows environment (It is something Microsoft actually did VERY well). Else look for roaming profile solutions online? Sep 24, 2013 at 19:45
  • Thank you for your answer. Unfortunately migrating to Windows is not feasible. I will look into roaming profiles.
    – Mani M
    Sep 25, 2013 at 17:33

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Simple solution i use at work working well and no security problem so far: autofs You can find a lot of information about 'autofs' on the Net easily.

Make sure each user folder are 'chmod 700' and owned by them.

:-)

Here is a quick sample of the config i use:

Start NFS home directory automount:
Now, on the NIS client, set up automount to handle /home. In /etc/auto.master:
/home /etc/auto.home

And create /etc/auto.home with these contents:
* rw,sync hostname.of.nfs.server:/home/&

Then restart autofs, and make sure it starts at boot:

service autofs restart
chkconfig autofs on
service nfs start
service ypbind start (nis)
chkconfig nfs on; chkconfig ypbind on;

Configuration of NIS is another subject.

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  • I will look into that. Thank you.(Unfortunately currently I do not have minimum rep to up-vote the answer!)
    – Mani M
    Sep 25, 2013 at 17:35
  • the /home folder must be empty on the client that use autofs for this config to work.
    – JackDan
    Sep 26, 2013 at 20:35

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