Linux

If you're going to have any non-linux clients, samba will be an order of magnitude easier. MacOS handles nfs pretty well, but Windows just wants SMB

NFS v4 with krb is probably the best option of these if Linux/macOS is all you need to support because everything just works transparently with one system-wide mount. I had it set up for a couple years until recently (had to basically completely give up on my network setup including the box the KDC was running on for unrelated reasons recently and have still yet to set it up completely again).

Kerberos is pretty straightforward to set up if you know how it works, I think the main problem is lack of documentation and pretty awful NFS error messages (you pretty much have to enable nfsd/rpc debug kernel options if you want to even begin figuring out what's going wrong when your mount doesn't work). The first time I set it up it took me a whole day to get it to actually work, and in the end a reboot of the NFS server solved the problem I had.

Look at the Arch wiki article for Kerberos, I think that's what I used mostly. Feel free to ask if you need help setting it up.

(Unfortunately IMO all of these suck in different ways though: sshfs dies if your SSH connection gets interrupted, NFS v4 (v3 is unusable imo because it doesn't have idmap so you have to make sure your user IDs match on every machine) isn't supported by Windows and mobile devices, Samba doesn't map well to Unix permissions and I can't tell what its "unix extensions" are actually supposed to do if it isn't permissions. Integrating Samba with NFS, if you want to use both, also is pretty hard because while Samba theoretically uses Kerberos, it doesn't work with a normal KDC but needs Samba AD because Microsoft (I haven't taken a look at Samba AD yet). And forget integrating Samba with anything that isn't Kerberos-based entirely because NTLM is the only other auth mechanism and it's pretty much incompatible with anything because the client only sends the password hashed with a unique mechanism. So you're going to have a pretty bad time if you want to use a single auth mechanism for everything if SMB is involved, and that's pretty much your only option if you want to access stuff on a mobile device.)

I've got both Samba and NFS set up. I'd say Samba is the most versatile, just because more devices are bound to be compatible with it out of the box. I have an app on my phone I can use to connect to it, for example. And it obviously works with Windows machines. NFS is very simple to set up and nice and speedy. But I only use it for a couple permanent shares for specific things between Linux machines. You could always use a mix. I have a directory that's shared with both.

I've never configured Kerberos I think, might've tried once in the past. From what I understand it's a pain to set up and really more useful for enterprise environments. But could be fun to configure if you're into tinkering with that sort of thing.

Sshfs afaik is used for a different purpose than the others

I usually use it when I'm working on a remote machine for a long duration and want to use my local tools (so I don't have to install them on the server, and because using neovim over SSH on a crappy connection sucks)

i use nfs. always. every minute my computer is online it has a mounted directory from my server.

via nfs and wireguard.

i tried lots of things but nfs which listens on wireguard ip is the best i ever achieved.

Moved to Truenas Scale and decided to setup NFS shares for my Linux server. Spent a lot of time troubleshooting the fstab config and file/share permissions. Switched to CIFS/SAMBA and had it working in about 15 minutes.

• NFS : historically insecure by default. Don't know about Kerberos making it secure but Kerberos does not look easy to configure.

• sshfs : probably most easy to setup. Can be confusing with ownership and permissions sometimes.

• Samba : solid but has a learning curve, even for a simple setup. For example, for a standalone Samba server omitting the Active Directory part, you need to know that in order to create a Samba user you must first have created a local user with the same username.

https://wiki.samba.org/index.php/Setting_up_Samba_as_a_Standalone_Server

The nice thing about Samba is that you can find clients for everything.

NFS is a terrific pain in the ass

You'll probbly want samba then. Much easier to set up, including account security.

I personally switched from samba to nfs for my linux iso collection because the overhead was causing lag on my tv box. Books won't have this issue.

Honestly I just use SMB with Samba now it's very fast and secure with the v3 protocol, It gets more complicated if you need AD/LDAP auth but most people don't especially on a home network.

NFS is too much of a pain in the ass. I would not use sshfs unless you need to connect over the Internet and a VPN isn't an option available to you.

Other options like SFTP, DAV, emulating S3 aren't really aiming to fill the same use cases SMB does.

I ran SSHFS for a while maybe half a year ago? I quite liked it cause we obviously already use SSH so setup was quick and easy, performance was good too. Then I learnt it's no longer maintained so switched to NFS.

NFS is good, if you aren't accessing from Windows I would go for that. Setup is pretty simple too, just change /etc/exports and a few permissions or ownerships (after installing the package obviously) then start the systemd service.

Can't comment on Kerberos, but considering NFS popularity I can't imagine it being difficult.

SSHFS will be incredibly slow. I would avoid it personally.

NFS will be performant and is easy to set up. This being said by default NFS is without any security.

The problem is that Kerberos is a huge pain to set up. I would avoid this unless you really need Kerberos.

If you want security NFS + WireGuard will serve you well.

Also I would consider Samba/CIFS if it is for local convenient fine access. It’s not super secure but for me it’s a good trade off.

Follow-up question:

Is anybody really using NFS?

I have found SMB to be sufficient. The network folder in the file browser is really nice. I don't think NFS has that.

In my personal experience and for my personal needs smb has worked best for me even though it feels kinda "bad" because of the windows background. However that also makes it useful, too, as it is compatible with most os'es...

Security setup is easy. Performance good (in my experience better than sshfs but i am sure sshfs transfers are more secure than smb).

I use SSHFS when I want to quickly grab a file off my server at home.

It is not a permanent solution, but it is fast and SSH is almost never blocked so the network I'm coming from doesn't matter.

Also SSH is great, if I don't trust the network I'm on, I tunnel all of my traffic through my home server over a SSH connection (this worked whilst I was in China a few years ago, waiting for my connecting flight).