– Ubiquitous in modern Microsoft Server and Workstation systems
• Originally derived from SMB
– Also used by Windows as a high level Communications Protocol
• Remote Printing, Network Management & Authentication etc.
– CIFS is typically a Stateful Protocol
• Provides better security, supports file locking
– Also supported on most Unix & Linux platforms
• Samba - development started 1991 - still growing
Disadvantages:
– Server failure resiliency over unreliable connections
Windows systems support the CIFS protocol. There is no additional software to purchase and install. networking tools.
Administration is consistent with other Microsoft
CIFS is also available on Unix servers via products like Samba. These products enable Unix servers to share networked file systems with PC clients using CIFS.
CIFS is stateful, which means protocol handling software retains some knowledge of the work in progress. From a practical perspective being stateful allows for higher security (by utilizing server side authentication) and also makes mandatory file locking easier to implement, but it isn’t as robust when the connection is either congested or intermittent. Both the client and the server track the status of the current connection and transfer.