On the client machine, you will needs to install a few packages to make authentication function correctly with an LDAP server:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libpam-ldap nscd
You will be asked a variety of questions similar to the those asked when you were installing the server components.
LDAP server Uniform Resource Identifier: ldap://LDAP-server-IP-Address
Distinguished name of the search base:
/etc/phpldapadmin/config.php
file.LDAP version to use: 3
Make local root Database admin: Yes
Does the LDAP database require login? No
LDAP account for root:
/etc/phpldapadmin/config.php
.LDAP root account password: Your-LDAP-root-password
If you make a mistake and need to change a value, you can go through the menu again by issuing this command:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure ldap-auth-config
We have to adjust a few files to tell our authentication files that they can look to our LDAP server for authentication information.
First, edit the /etc/nsswitch.conf
file. This will allow us to specify that the LDAP credentials should be modified when users issue authentication change commands.
sudo nano /etc/nsswitch.conf
The three lines we are interested in are the "passwd", "group", and "shadow" definitions. Modify them to look like this:
passwd: ldap compat group: ldap compat shadow: ldap compat
Next, we will add a value to our PAM configuration.
PAM, or Pluggable Authentication Modules, is a system that connects applications that can provide authentication to applications that require authentication.
PAM is already implemented on most computers, and works behind the scenes without needing user interaction. When we installed and configured our LDAP PAM module, most of the needed information was added to the configuration files.
Edit the /etc/pam.d/common-session
file:
sudo nano /etc/pam.d/common-session
Add a line to the bottom of the configuration that reads:
session required pam_mkhomedir.so skel=/etc/skel umask=0022
This will create a home directory on the client machine when an LDAP user logs in who does not have a home directory.
We have to restart a service for these changes to be implemented:
sudo /etc/init.d/nscd restart
During the LDAP server configuration, we created a group called "admin". This was not chosen at random. It coincides with the "admin" group that is created by default on Ubuntu machines.
The LDAP users that you added to the "admin" group will have access to the sudo
command.
This is because we have a line that gives members of the "admin" group sudo access within the/etc/sudoers
file. Edit the file by issuing this command:
sudo visudo
There is a line that reads:
%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
Entries that begin with a percentage sign (%) specify a group instead of a user. If you wish to disable this functionality, or only grant specific users this functionality, comment out this line:
#%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
We have now configured our client machine enough to be able to log in as one of our LDAP users. This user does not have to exist on the client machine.
In a new terminal window (it is best to keep your original terminal window logged in, in case of a configuration mistake), ssh into the client machine using an LDAP user's credentials:
ssh LDAP_user@LDAP_client_IP_Address
You should be able to log in as if your user had been created locally. Issue the print working directory command:
pwd
You should see that the home directory you selected for your user on the LDAP server is being used on this machine. It has been created on-demand to serve the LDAP user.
If you log out and log in with a different LDAP user, you can see that there will be two home directory entries:
ls /home
user1 user2
If your user is part of the "admin" group and you didn't disable the ability in the previous section, you will have normal sudo access, otherwise, you will not.
If you issue the passwd
command to change your password, you can see that it will be modifying your LDAP credentials:
passwd
Enter login(LDAP) password: