2. Defining a group

Here are the steps to create an administration group:

2.1 Give it a name

Each group must have a unique name. The name must not have any space. Each group corresponds to a subdirectory in

        /etc/linuxconf/admgroups
        

The name of the subdirectory is simply the group name.

2.2 Give it a description

This is used to enhance various screens. It has no functional usage.

2.3 Link it with an administration tree

An administration tree is like a virtual workstation in your computer. It either has (or could have) all the configuration files a fully configured Linux station would normally have. By linking to a specific administration tree, you are saying that this administration group is picking all or parts of its configuration files from the configuration files of this administration tree.

The idea of separating the administration tree from the administration group is in many environments. You will have one administration tree and the machine's part of this environment will split it this way:

• Most machines: share a large part of the administration tree.
• Some machines: share the same information except for specific services only.
• Some other machines: are completely independent. As such, they are not members of any administration group.

Often, all machines on the same physical network will share some aspect of a single administration tree.

A help list shows available administration trees. You can enter a name which is not in the list; just don't forget to create it later.

The / administration tree

It is possible to share the configuration of the workstation itself. The administration tree is simply called / and is shown in the help list.

2.4 Members of the group

Simply enumerate the various members (the machine names and domains) who must be synchronized. This is currently limited as you have to specify them one by one, but is expected to expand in various areas:

• Allowing the definition of pseudo members which will themselves repeat the configuration file to other machines. A repeater may act this way for several administration groups.
• Allowing for usage of wild cards: *.domain.com.
• Allowing for usage of network/netmask pairs.
• Allowing for on demand supply of configuration files, since such administration groups may very well have no official members!

2.5 Subsystem to share

A list of all subsystems available is presented. On the left, the subsystem ID is presented. On the right, the description of the subsystem is presented. For each subsystem, there is a checkbox. You can select which subsystems are shared.