[Discuss] Using sftp without a shell account

[markw at mohawksoft.com]

NSS is a lot of fun, there are a number of projects that allow you to
create actual "real" users on a system that can be authenticated via any
system you want.

You can use openssh to create valid password hashes. You can use PAM to
add authentication if you don't want to mimic "/etc/shadow" passwords.

There are NSS projects to use sqlite, mssql, postgresql, and files in
another directory, which, if not mistaken, can be nfs mounted.

> On 12/29/2014 3:16 PM, Derek Martin wrote:
>> On Sun, Dec 28, 2014 at 08:58:13PM -0500, Bill Horne wrote:
>>> I'm setting up an LDAP-based server, which will be used for file
>>> transfers among other things. I'd like to allow LDAP users to access
>>> the machine via sftp, but I can't figure out how to do that without
>>> giving each user a local shell account, and I'm looking for advice.
>> The long and short of it is you need to make sure that OpenSSH is
>> using PAM, and that your PAM configuration is correct for doing LDAP
>> lookups for account info and such.  You also need to modify
>> /etc/nsswitch.conf.
>
> I don't see an nsswitch.conf file on the machine.
>
>>
>> This page may or may not be useful:
>>
>>    https://wiki.debian.org/LDAP/NSS
>
> I'll check it out, thanks.
>
>>
>>> The LDAP users can access ftp without trouble, but not sftp.
>> That is potentially interesting, but there are a wide variety of ftp
>> servers, and configuring authentication for them varies as well.
>> Without more details about how your system is configured, I expect it
>> will be difficult to provide additional useful advice.
>
> It's a Mac Mini, with a generic OS X Yosemite installation, and OS X
> Server 4.1 installed.
>
> There are a couple of "local" users, which are just administrative
> accounts. Everyone else is a "network" user, entered in Open DIrectory
> but not in the local machine. I'm hoping that Open Directory is "close
> enough" to OpenLDAP that I can transfer knowledge.
>
> Thanks for your help!
>
> Bill
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