So my Windows work PC is connected to the company’s AD. VPN Connection is done with L2TP with PAP and a Yubikey.
I’d like to work from within a Linux environment if possible but need access to the files on the network drive and connect to a terminal server via VPN and RDP.

Is there a way to set this up? My first idea was, maybe a Linux VM could be configured to share the host PC’s external network adapter so from the outside it looks like the Windows machine is connected?
If there’s no other way, maybe WSL can be set up with a full screen X Server running on Windows (or is running Wayland in WSL somehow possible?)

I’m fishing for ideas here, and really just need some fitting terms to google, any help is appreciated.

Questions about violating company policy can be disregarded at the moment. If there is a way to set it up, I’ll ask my boss before implementing it, but it’s a small shop so the need hasn’t arisen for anyone else yet. To be clear, this is not about circumventing restrictions on computer use, just about working in an environment I’m more productive in.

  • aairey@lemmy.world
    24·
    11 months ago

    Yes.

    First you will need to get the VPN up (or be in the office, in the same network to be able to join the AD domain.

    Then you need to join the AD domain using realmd. This will join the computer to the AD domain like any regular windows PC. It will set up the Kerberos client, DNS and everything for you (this part is done in sssd).

    Once joined you should be able to access the network shares with SMB.

    RedHat and deriviates have good support for this. So I would recommend Fedora Workstation, CentOS Stream or RHEL Desktop to set this up in.

    docs: https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/7/html/windows_integration_guide/ch-configuring_authentication

    • beerclue@lemmy.world
      8·
      11 months ago

      You don’t need to join the domain to access that smb share… You have to use the DOMAIN\username when authenticating though.

      • aairey@lemmy.world
        4·
        11 months ago

        Sure, that works too.

        But based on OP it seemed to me that the larger intent is to get a Linux workstation set up in an AD environment. He wants to show to his boss it can be done, and this is the most integrated way.

        • beerclue@lemmy.world
          1·
          11 months ago

          Fair enough. I just read it like “I need to access a smb share from a Linux machine” :)

  • beerclue@lemmy.world
    133·
    11 months ago

    If you use WSL, you can easily access the windows drives. In a VM, you can share the folder from the host.

    Another method would be to just mount the remote smb location from your DC using fstab. I use Linux on bare metal, and I added a line to my remote share with noauto, so it doesn’t mount it automatically at boot, since I need to connect to the VPN first, and I don’t need permanent access. When I do need access, I just run mount adm and I’m in.

  • h3ndrik@feddit.de
    4·
    11 months ago

    I think you can mount network shares with the Kerberos token you got from AD. Sometimes just the user credentials suffice. At least that’s how it used to be when I last tried something like that years ago.

  • Pheonixtail@lemmy.world
    62·
    11 months ago

    My understanding is that there are modules you can install to AD join a linux machine, i don’t know much about it unfortunatly because it’s not something i’ve ever had to do. I’m also unclear whether there is a different process per distro type.

    I would speak to your company IT about it tbh.

  • Petter1@lemm.ee
    45·
    11 months ago

    I guess WSL is best way, but I think you’ll only be able to have the Linux windows like windows windows in the taskbar of windows and launch them with windows