Re: With smb1 unix extensions gone, any way to export existing symlinks to Linux clients as symlinks?

On Mon, 27 Apr 2026 14:59:00 +0200
"Dr. Thomas Orgis via samba" <[email protected]> wrote:

> Am Mon, 27 Apr 2026 11:46:09 +0200
> schrieb Ralph Boehme <[email protected]>:
> 
> > On 4/27/26 10:34 AM, Dr. Thomas Orgis via samba wrote:
> > > Or is there some sane way to get read-only 'real' symlinks
> > > exported to clients with current samba?  
> > 
> > this should just work. Existing symlinks on the server should be
> > seen as symlinks by the client (via reparse points on the wire).
> 
> Oh? That would be cool. This means I'm doing something wrong.
> 
> I did not have an option pertaining to that in smb.conf, as the
> documentation / info I could find did not suggest that this kind of
> read-only symlinks works. Specifically
> 
> follow symlinks (S)
> 
>     This parameter allows the Samba administrator to stop smbd(8) from
>     following symbolic links in a particular share. Setting this
>     parameter to no prevents any file or directory that is a symbolic
>     link from being followed (the user will get an error). This option
>     is very useful to stop users from adding a symbolic link to
>     /etc/passwd in their home directory for instance. However it will
>     slow filename lookups down slightly. 
> 
> 
> The 'user will get an error'? Not the link?  I now added follow
> symlinks = no to my smb.conf:
> 
> [global]
> security = user
> map to guest = Bad Password
> server role = standalone server
> smb ports = 1445
> log file = /srv/cernvmfs/smb.log
> log level = 0
> follow symlinks = no
> 
> [cvmfs]
> path = /srv/cernvmfs/mount
> guest ok = yes
> read only = yes
> 
> But with that, the link just gets hidden:
> 
> server:~# stat /srv/cernvmfs/mount/hello.txt 
>   File: /srv/cernvmfs/mount/hello.txt
>   Size: 6               Blocks: 8          IO Block: 4096   regular
> file Device: 253,7   Inode: 17563651    Links: 1
> Access: (0644/-rw-r--r--)  Uid: (    0/    root)   Gid: (    0/
> root) Access: 2026-03-15 15:26:39.849351781 +0100
> Modify: 2026-03-15 15:26:17.237719073 +0100
> Change: 2026-03-15 15:26:17.237719073 +0100
>  Birth: 2026-03-15 15:26:17.237719073 +0100
> server:~# stat /srv/cernvmfs/mount/hello.link 
>   File: /srv/cernvmfs/mount/hello.link -> hello.txt
>   Size: 9               Blocks: 0          IO Block: 4096   symbolic
> link Device: 253,7   Inode: 17563652    Links: 1
> Access: (0777/lrwxrwxrwx)  Uid: (    0/    root)   Gid: (    0/
> root) Access: 2026-04-27 13:57:37.585419703 +0200
> Modify: 2026-04-27 13:57:36.557433804 +0200
> Change: 2026-04-27 13:57:36.557433804 +0200
>  Birth: 2026-04-27 13:57:36.557433804 +0200
> 
> client:~# stat  /cvmfs/hello.txt
>   File: /cvmfs/hello.txt
>   Size: 6               Blocks: 8          IO Block: 1048576 regular
> file Device: 0,80    Inode: 17563651    Links: 1
> Access: (0755/-rwxr-xr-x)  Uid: (    0/    root)   Gid: (    0/
> root) Access: 2026-03-15 15:26:39.849351700 +0100
> Modify: 2026-03-15 15:26:17.237719000 +0100
> Change: 2026-03-15 15:26:17.237719000 +0100
>  Birth: 2026-03-15 15:26:17.237719000 +0100
> 
> client:~# stat /cvmfs/hello.link
> stat: cannot statx '/cvmfs/hello.link': No such file or directory
> 
> client:~# time ls -l /cvmfs
> total 4
> drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 0 Aug 29  2014 cms.cern.ch
> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 6 Mar 15 15:26 hello.txt
> 
> real    0m0.740s
> user    0m0.000s
> sys     0m0.002s
> 
> (The 'root' on the server is actually an unprivileged user in a
> namespace.)
> 
> This is without the respective FUSE filesystem (CernVM-FS) being
> involved yet, that is in the subdirectory.
> 
> The smb.conf is this:
> 
> [global]
> security = user
> map to guest = Bad Password
> server role = standalone server
> smb ports = 1445
> log file = /srv/cernvmfs/smb.log
> log level = 0
> 
> [cvmfs]
> path = /srv/cernvmfs/mount
> guest ok = yes
> read only = yes
> 
> The cvmfs one is mounted on /cvmfs/ on the clients.
> 
> Is there something else I need to add to make the symlinks show up?
> Hm, maybe on the client side.
> 
> client:~# grep cvmfs /proc/mounts 
> //server/cvmfs /cvmfs smb3
> rw,relatime,vers=3.1.1,cache=strict,username=guest,uid=0,noforceuid,gid=0,noforcegid,addr=172.25.21.182,file_mode=0755,dir_mode=0755,soft,nounix,serverino,mapposix,reparse=nfs,rsize=4194304,wsize=4194304,bsize=1048576,retrans=1,echo_interval=60,actimeo=1,closetimeo=1
> 0 0
> 
> I do not remember to ask for nounix. I did the mount via
> 
> 	mount -t smb3 -o user=guest,password=foo,port=1445
> //server/cvmfs cvmfs/
> 
> But I do see that my smbd/smb.conf doesn't offer posix SMB3.11. But
> mfsymlinks gives no error … but also no results.
> 
> I now realize that I do need support for smb3 unix extensions and that
> I run smbd 4.17 on Debian 12, wich is simply too old for this, as it
> seems. In this scenario … I in fact can still do this:

As I thought, your version of Samba is too old, if you do not want to
update the entire OS, enable bookworm-backports and Use Samba from
there, that will get you to 4.22.6 and smb3 Unix extensions.

> 
> server:~# grep protoc  /srv/home/cernvmfs/smb.conf 
> server min protocol = NT1
> server max protocol = NT1

But do not set 'server max protocol = NT1' doing that would turn off
SMB3 (as would 'client max protocol = NT1')

Do you have computers running SMB1 that are not capable of anything
higher ?

Rowland

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