MKSMBPASSWD(8)

📦 version 4.15.13, in ubuntu jammy

💖 MKSMBPASSWD 💖

okay bestie, welcome to mksmbpasswd, section 8 of the System Manager's Manual — aka the lil glow-up tool that formats a /etc/passwd entry for a smbpasswd file. yes, that's the whole job. she's niche, she's specific, she's iconic. 🎀

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

mksmbpasswd cat /etc/passwd | /usr/sbin/mksmbpasswd > /etc/samba/smbpasswd

that's the vibe. literally copy it, character for character, i am not kidding. 💅

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so here's the tea, bestie: mksmbpasswd should be used only once — like, the very first time Samba is installed. that's her moment. her one (1) main character appearance. 👑

the whole idea is to make account creation easier by transferring all user accounts from /etc/passwd into /etc/samba/smbpasswd. easy peasy, right?

🚨 BUT WAIT. not so fast. please note that passwords are not transferred automatically from /etc/passwd to the new /etc/samba/smbpasswd file. no magical password teleportation happening here, sorry. 🙈

and it gets realer: after running mksmbpasswd, all accounts are disabled. every single one. so the system administrator has to run smbpasswd for each account that needs to be enabled. yes, one by one. i know. i KNOW. 😭

🌸 FILES 🌸

  • /etc/passwd — the system wide accounts file. the OG.
  • /etc/samba/smbpasswd — the encrypted passwords file for the Samba daemons. the secure lil vault. 🔐

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

samba(7), nmbd(8), smbd(8)

go read those too, they're part of the extended universe. ✨

💜 AUTHOR 💜

Eloy A. Paris <peloy@debian.org> — and yes, this man page is based on sendmailconfig's man page by Robert Leslie <rob@mars.org>. credit where credit is due, we stan. 🫶

and that's the page, bestie!! this gem is from 12-Apr-1998, it lives in the System Manager's Manual, and honestly? vintage. retro. lowkey a time capsule. periodt. 💅⭐🧚

📦 where this page comes from