g4sra <g4sra@???> wrote:

> To clarify some points raised.
>
> 1) Approx 200 trainees each year, the full course is three years long (but class size will be 30 maximum at any one session). By year 3... 600 Users. After year 3 the trainees details may be purged and resources reclaimed so the server will never have to support more than 600 accounts.
>
> 2) The trainees progress is stored in a .subdirectory of their home directory by the (annoyingly) proprietary closed source training software.
>
> 3) The trainees cannot be guaranteed to be sat in the same seat at every training session. In fact, must move to one of the few workstations with a joystick\graphical tablet for specific lessons.

OK those 3 pretty well mandate centralised user management - Samba AD, NIS, whatever. Items 2&3 pretty well mandates using a central file server mounted at each user workstation for the users' files.
For file sharing, there are pros and cons for different methods. NFS has the advantage of allowing a single mount that works for all users - the security/permissions management is done by the client system which in this case is a machine you manage and can trust (as long as it's been reasonably well secured against "inquisitive" users. Samba needs a mount/user and security/permissions is handled by the server. A bit of "6 of one, half a dozen of the other".

> 4) A downed workstation must be easily replaced without loss of trainees work.

Home directory & files in server, plus automatic rebuild for workstations - box ticked.


Would have saved a bit of speculation and discussion had these details been provided earlier :-/