Improvements to the 13.5. Kerberos chapter?

From: Michael Hoffmann <michael.hoffmann_at_fh-dortmund.de>
Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2025 14:52:27 UTC
Hello,

Is this the right place to make suggestions?

I used the FreeBSD Handbook for setting up Kerberos (Heimdal) and wanted to recommend two ideas. You might consider
them for the Handbook chapter '13.5. Kerberos'.


## Missing kpasswd daemon inhibits usage of remote '$ passwd'

I would suggest starting the kpasswd daemon, too. Without it, nobody will be able to change their own password
after the first login. Therefore, in chapter '13.5.1 Setting up a Heimdal KDC' you would like to add something like

kpasswdd_enable="YES"

after

kdc_enable="YES"
kadmind_enable="YES"

in your 'rc.conf' file (found under '13.5.1. Setting up a Heimdal KDC').


## Is this configuration still ok?

Maybe I got this wrong, but in '13.5.4. MIT Differences' you said 'When using MIT Kerberos as a KDC on FreeBSD,
the following edits should also be made to rc.conf':

kerberos5_server="/usr/local/sbin/krb5kdc"
kadmind5_server="/usr/local/sbin/kadmind"
kerberos5_server_flags=""

This confuses me. In my default 'rc.conf' under 13.4-RELEASE-p5 I found these values
(should this not work with 'security/krb5' aka MIT Kerberos?):

kdc_program="/usr/libexec/kdc"
kadmind_program="/usr/libexec/kadmind"
kpasswdd_program="/usr/libexec/kpasswdd"

I run Heimdal and I had to alter them in my 'rc.conf' to this:

kdc_program="/usr/local/libexec/kdc"
kadmind_program="/usr/local/libexec/kadmind"
kpasswdd_program="/usr/local/libexec/kpasswdd"

For me that sounds like you believe the default setting is suitable for Heimdal, but I use my config as shown.
(I found my settings by using '$ pkg list heimdal | grep libexec' and they are fine to me.)

Regards,
Michael