I am soon going to need to either replace my Windows 2003 active directory with 2008 server or find another solution. I would prefer to use a linux server for authentication but I will need the same configuration features.

I have been looking for a good guide to setting up CentOS as an alternative to Active Directory, but have not found one yet.

The features I want to see.
1. works with Windows clients.
2. Network Home folders (does not neessisarly need to hold profile information)
3. Logon scripts for clients.
4. shared printers
5. shared folders.
6. can log linux boxes in with the same credentials and logon scripts.

-bj

There are several directory servers that should be able to do this.

OpenLdap, Centos or Fedora Directory Server, Sun Directory Server, Sun OpenDirectory (I think that's the name).

As for documentation comparable to Windows documentation in setup--hrrm, if you find it, let me know. I would say out of the bunch that Fedora Directory server is probably the best documented.

DISCLAIMER--I've only used OpenLDAP and Sun Directory server, and have not done all the things mentioned in your requirements.

I think I would start by reading the docs for Fedora Directory server, and see if it's worth a try. I recommend it over the CentOS one simply because it's been around a bit longer. (It's now called the 389 directory server.)

http://directory.fedoraproject.org/

Here are the answers (based on Samba/OpenLDAP backend)

1. works with Windows clients. -> yes
2. Network Home folders (does not neessisarly need to hold profile information) -> yes
3. Logon scripts for clients. -> yes (for windows machines)
4. shared printers -> yes
5. shared folders. -> yes
6. can log linux boxes in with the same credentials and logon scripts. -> yes

But forget about all those AD only features like GPOs.
You have to know that there is no way to migrate from AD to Samba/Openldap meaning that you have to create a new domain and "migrate" all users/groups/machines from AD to the Samba "NT4 style" domain, etc, etc ...

One solution i found for GPOs is
by running them at login script on group based as simple registry batch editing lines
but it takes long time to figure all keys