CIFS(4) CIFS(4)
NAME
cifs - Microsofttm Windows filesystem client
SYNOPSIS
aux/cifs [ -dDvb ] [ -a auth-method ] [ -s srvname ] [ -n
called-name ] [ -k keyparam ] [ -m mntpnt ] host [ share...
]
DESCRIPTION
Cifs translates between the Microsoft's file sharing proto-
col, (AKA CIFS or SMB), and 9P, allowing Plan9 clients to
mount file systems (shares or trees in MS terminology) pub-
lished by such servers.
The root of the mounted directory contains one subdirectory
per share, always named in lower case, and a few virtual
files of mixed case which give additional server, session,
share, and user information. The options are:
-D 9P request debug.
-d CIFS packet debug.
-b Enable file ownership resolution in stat(2) calls. This
requires an open and close per file and thus will slow
cifs considerably its use is not reccomended.
-a auth-method
Cifs authenticates using NTLM by default, alternative
stratigies may be selected using this option. Cifs
enshews cleartext authentication, however it may be
enabled with the plain auth method. The list of cur-
rently supported methods is printed if no method name
is supplied.
Windows server 2003 requires the NTLMv2 method by
default though it can be configured to be more flexi-
ble.
-s srvname
post the service as /srv/ srvname
-n called-name
The CIFS protocol requires clients to know the NetBios
name of the server they are attaching to, the called-
name. If this is not specified on the command line Cifs
attempts to discover this name from the remote server.
If this fails it will then try host, finally it will
try the name *SMBSERVER.
CIFS(4) CIFS(4)
-k keyparam
lists extra parameters which will be passed to facto-
tum(4) to remove key ambiguity. The remote servers's
domain is always included in the keyspec, under the
assumption that all servers in a Windows domain share
an authentication domain; Thus cifs expects keys in
factotum of the form:
key proto=pass dom=THEIR-DOMAIN service=cifs
user=MY-USERNAME !password=XYZZY
-m mntpnt
set the mount point for the remote filesystem; the
default is /n/host.
host The address of the remote server to connect to.
share
A list of share names to attach on the remote server,
if none given cifs will attempt to attach all shares
published by the remote host.
VIRTUAL FILES
Several virtual files appear in the root of the mounted
filesystem:
Shares
Contains a list of the currently attached shares, with
fields giving the share name, disk free space / capac-
ity, the share type, and a descriptive comment from the
server.
Connection
Contains the username used for authentication, server's
called name, server's domain, server's OS, the time
slip between the local host and the server, the Maximum
Transfer Unit (MTU) the server requested, and option-
ally a flag indicating only guest access has been
granted. The seccond line contains a list of capabili-
ties offered by the server which is mainly of use for
debugging cifs(1)
Users
Each line contains a user's name, the users full name,
and a descriptive comment.
Groups
Each line gives a group's name, and a list of the names
of the users who are members of that group.
Sessions
Lists the users authenticated, the client machine's
NetBios name or IP address, the time since the
CIFS(4) CIFS(4)
connection was established, and the time for which the
connection has been idle.
Domains
One line per domain giving the domain name and a
descriptive comment.
Workstations
One line per domain giving the domain name and a
descriptive comment, the version number of the OS it is
running, and comma seperated list of flags giving the
features of that OS.
Dfsroot
Top level DFS routing giving the DFS link type, time to
live of the data, proximity of the server, the Netbios
or DNS name and a physical path or a machine that this
maps to.
DNS paths are usually assigned dynamicially as a form
of load balancing.
BUGS
The NetApp Filer compatibility has not yet been tested,
there may not be any.
DFS supported is not yet completed.
Kerbros authentication is not yet supported.
NetBios name resolution is not supported, though it is now
rarely used.
Cifs has only been tested against aquarela(1) Windows 95,
NT4.0sp6, Windows server 2003, WinXP pro, Samba 3.0, and
Samba 2.0 (Pluto VideoSpace). No support is attempted for
servers predating NT4.0.
HISTORY
Cifs was written by Steve Simon, It is a re-implementation
of an earlier client written by Russ Cox and William Joseph-
son.