Subject: Re: Netatalk and aliases

From: Aaron Levitt <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 08:56:37 -0700

Greets everyone-

Just thought I would pass on some info from the information I have gathered and the testing I have done in the last few days.  I started this thread (although there have been a couple others on this subject) and I really appreciate all the info I received from you all.  It was a great help.

My original set up was on a red hat 6.1 (kernel 2.2.13-0.13) using netatalk netatalk-1.4b2+asun2.1.3 (which I believe is the latest non-test package).  It is configured using mostly defaults.  Both atalkd ("classic appletalk server") and afpd ("appletalk over TCP/IP" or Appleshare IP server) running.  I encountered a couple problems that most people seem to have had as well.  The main problem that was making me unsure about rolling this out to my company being that aliases created on the share were pretty unreliable.  

On a new server we just set up, I decided that based on the great emails I received from the list, I would try out the latest test that Adrian was working on (thanx for the forward Jonathan!).  I installed pre-asun2.1.4-39_test on a box running red hat 6.1 as well (with an OEM'ed 2.2.14 kernel).  I am pleased to report that all of the problems I had with the older version of netatalk have gone away.  I tested it out by creating aliases from MacOS8.1, 8.5, 8.6 and 9.0.x and then trying out the aliases on the various machines as well.  It all seems to work great.  Also, the newer version allows configuration from a few .conf files that weren't available in the earlier release, giving much more flexibility and personalization.  The connections seem faster and more resilient as well.

To be completely honest, the test is still a bit incomplete due to the fact we are waiting on the hardware vendor to figure out what we have to do to upgrade our kernel without losing support for our hardware.  This means that we don't currently have appletalk compiled into the kernel, thereby not allowing the atalkd (classic appleshare server) to run.  So, the results of the tests are only from the afpd server.  The only downside to the way it is set up now, is it isn't browseable from the chooser on the mac side (you have to enter the ip address/hostname to mount the share).  We are continuing to deal with the vender and may still compile appletalk into the kernel but I'm not sure that one advantage is worth the hassle.  

However, I would really be interested in knowing if using atalkd also might re-introduce the aliases problem or any other problems.  Has anyone else used 39_test yet??  I am interested in comparing results if anyone has it up and running yet, as we are looking to roll this out company-wide in the next couple weeks.

Sorry for such a long mail, but again I wanted to give back to the number of people that responded and offered suggestions.  I hope this information helps out some other people as well.  BTW, if anyone is interested in trying it out that may have missed the earlier mail that was forwarded to me.. it is available at ftp://ftp.cobaltnet.com/pub/users/asun/testing/pre-asun2.1.4-38_test.tar.gz.

-Aaron

>>>>====--------====<<<<>>>>====--------====<<<<
Aaron Levitt		1616 Franklin Street
Systems Administrator	Oakland, CA  94612
Navis LLC		Tel:  510-763-5715
http://www.navis.com	Fax:  510-763-2516
>>>>====--------====<<<<>>>>====--------====<<<<

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From: andrew morgan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 09:23:10 -0700 (PDT)

On Thu, 22 Jun 2000, Aaron Levitt wrote:

> To be completely honest, the test is still a bit incomplete due to the
> fact we are waiting on the hardware vendor to figure out what we have
> to do to upgrade our kernel without losing support for our hardware.  
> This means that we don't currently have appletalk compiled into the
> kernel, thereby not allowing the atalkd (classic appleshare server) to
> run.  So, the results of the tests are only from the afpd server.  
> The only downside to the way it is set up now, is it isn't browseable
> from the chooser on the mac side (you have to enter the ip
> address/hostname to mount the share).  We are continuing to deal with
> the vender and may still compile appletalk into the kernel but I'm not
> sure that one advantage is worth the hassle.

You should still be able to load appletalk as a kernel module without
recompiling your kernel.  Check if you have a file appletalk.o in
/lib/modules/<kernel version>/misc.  If you do, then you can load it
manually by typing "modprobe appletalk", and then atalkd should
successfully start.

> However, I would really be interested in knowing if using atalkd also
> might re-introduce the aliases problem or any other problems.  Has
> anyone else used 39_test yet??  I am interested in comparing results
> if anyone has it up and running yet, as we are looking to roll this
> out company-wide in the next couple weeks.

Atalk has nothing to do with aliases.  It just provides the Appletalk
networking transport.  Afpd handles all the file sharing details such as
aliases, so don't worry about breaking aliases by running atalkd.

Good luck, and thanks for the status report!

	Andy

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From: Aaron Levitt <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 13:20:11 -0700

> manually by typing "modprobe appletalk", and then atalkd should

Awesome!  We aren't real familiar with red hat here (most of our other *nix servers are AIX or BSD).  Thanx a ton for saving us from having to re-compile.  This has to be the most helpful mailing list I have ever been on!  

So, re: my last message.  Everything works and is great with the 39 release.  IMHO, if you are having problems, try the latest test release on for size.  Keep up the great work guys!!

-Aaron

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From: Kirk W Charles <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 16:33:46 -0400

Hi,
	We have multiple netatalk servers running. (as of today)  It would be
nice to have different icons on the desktop for each server.  It would
be really nice to have different icons for each share.  I know all this
is silly but Mac's have cool stuff. right?

Thanks
Kirk
-- 
Kirk W. Charles        Phone: 404-351-2042
Sundberg-Ferar         FAX:   404-352-9370
1850 Alma St.          E-mail: [email-masked]
Atlanta, GA 30318      www.sundbergf.com

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From: Ryan McBeth <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 06:53:25 -0400

I don't think that you can do it straight from Linux.

	The way I've done it is like this:

	Go to your Mac.
	Fire up a browser and go to www.iconfactory.com
	Download your icons.

	Changing the icon is as easy as cutting and pasting.

	First, control-click on the icon you like.
	Choose "Get Info".
	A window should pop up with information on the file.  Click on the
picture of the icon in the top left-hand corner.  A box should highlight
around the icon.  Then copy the icon to your clip board by using "Command
C" or Edit > Copy.

	Then find the icon of your server.
	Control-click on it, and "Get Info"
	Click on the picture of the server icon in the top-left hand
corner.  A box should highlight around the icon.  Then paste the icon in by
hitting "Command P" or Edit > Paste.

	The icon should propagate to the other Macs eventually.

	Ryan

>is silly but Mac's have cool stuff. right?

__________________________________
Ryan McBeth
Systems Administrator, Mobius New Media
Voice: (302) 475-9880 x11
FAX: (302) 475-9894
www.mobiusnm.com
__________________________________
If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this
second, quit doing less-than-excellent work.
-Thomas Watson, founder of IBM

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From: Harry Zink/Netatalk List <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 10:57:12 -0700

> is silly but Mac's have cool stuff. right?

cut and paste cooler icons on your desktop icons?

Harry