I have noticed that Webmin lets you configure a MySQL database for Webmin users which works nice.
I was wondering if its possible to use this database also for Linux users/groups, or its only limited to Webmin users?
If not is there a way to setup a cron or auto sync schedule for users/group among a Webmin cluster?
The reason I ask this is because you can do this manually under the cluster tab among servers and it works nice, but how about doing this once a day for example?
Im trying to avoid using LDAP for now and use Webmin integrated features as much as possible.
I was trying to stay away from LDAP also but looks like I’m headed that with because we also have an Asterisk phone system.
Anyways…
One thought that I had was to sync the users, groups, and password files between multiple machines using inotify to monitor the files and run unison to update the files on the remote machines.
I setup a private network between the servers and used ssh.
I decided not to go with this option because it required root access for updating remote files and I ran into some permission issues with some other stuff but still might work for users and groups.
I understand, using LDAP, MYSQL or any other centralized database would work for some stuff.
But this is just to much overhead for what I want. I don´t have hundreds of users and hundreds of changes per day.
You can manually click the sync user and groups now, so this means Webmin can do this already.
What I need is just the same command that does this, or executes this script internally, and put it in a cron.
I mean if the Web GUI can do this, I don´t see why this could not be done in the command line.
I just need to sync one user and group per day, and I don´t see how LDAP or centralize users in MYSQL would make things easier here, rather add more unnecessary complexity.
Sure, you can use tools like puppet, chef, etc, but why do I need to make things so complicated? Webmin can do this already, the web GUI sync command works, so if it can do this in a browser there should be no reason why it can do this in the command line with a cron.
All I want is to run this automatically instead of having to do this each day manually in the web GUI. Nothing fancy, just a simple cron.
Edit: Also, the MYSQL option is only available for Webmin users, not actually Linux users, I would use it otherwise.