Likewise Open-Sources Active Directory Authentication for Linux

"We are excited about the Likewise Open project and the solutions that it will provide Canonical's enterprise customers and other major deployments of Ubuntu," said Mark Shuttleworth, founder of the Ubuntu project, in a statement. "Likewise Open allows us to provide end users of the Ubuntu operating system the ability to join their systems to Microsoft Active Directory for user authentication. We look forward to the debut of Likewise Open in the April release of Ubuntu 8.04 Long Term Support."

Red Hat is on board too. "Likewise Open is an important development for our enterprise customers who wish to use open-source software to enable users of Red Hat Enterprise Linux to authenticate against Active Directory," said Karl Wirth, Red Hat's director of security business. "We plan to ship Likewise Open together with Samba in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.2."

After an early evaluation of Likewise Open by eWEEK's Jason Brooks, it's easy to see why the Linux vendors are enthusiastic about Likewise Open. While not perfect, it makes integrating AD and Linux systems much easier than the ad hoc, duct tape measures often used in the past to get AD and Linux working together.

The company also announced the release of the next commercial version of its AD/Linux and other operating system integration program: Likewise Enterprise 4.0.

"The non-Windows desktop group policy advancements in Likewise Enterprise 4.0 are a significant advancement," said Guy Lunardi, Novell's senior product manager for the SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop.

"With thousands of group policies to offer, Novell and Likewise Software are working with some of our largest SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop customers to lock down their desktops with Likewise Enterprise, for increased security and control. The ability to manage SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop machines using existing Active Directory group policies makes it even easier for customers to deploy Linux desktops alongside their existing Windows machines."

Likewise Enterprise 4.0 includes more than 500 Active Directory Group Policies for managing Linux, Unix and Mac servers and desktops. These include policies for security, authentication and identification, log-on, display, message, logging and audit, file system and tasks.

It also includes Linux desktop support. With this, administrators can set Linux desktop user configuration settings from AD. Thus, managers can centrally manage Linux desktops, easily set consistent group policy, and lock down desktop security with their familiar AD management tools. You can apply settings for the most popular Linux desktop applications such as Firefox and Evolution.

You don't have to manage AD from Windows with Likewise installed. Likewise makes it possible for Linux and Unix administrators to manage AD from their systems with the Likewise Administrative Console. This is a pluggable framework that provides MMC (Microsoft Management Console)-like functionality and runs on any Linux platform.

Likewise Enterprise 4.0 also allows local network managers to organize branch office organizational unit-level deployment and administration without enterprise domain administrative privileges. In addition, Likewise Enterprise 4.0 streamlines the customer's ability to allow users and groups to access resources by linking cells to share attributes across organizational units.

To learn more about Likewise Open or to participate in the open-source project, visit Likewise Open. Organizations can download a free evaluation copy of Likewise Enterprise 4.0 at the company's free trial page or by calling 800-378-1330.

Likewise Enterprise is priced at $249 per server license and $49 per workstation license.

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