Lion Server vs NAS System

Hello all,
I have a long and interesting question that i hope can be answered.
I currently have an imac running lion server and am starting to have problems with it getting slow and stuck. As i was going to fix the issue, i started to think about various nas drives that could replace the server and be much more effeciant then constantly trying to solve these problems. All i use my server for is file sharing, and with the release of ios 5, i was going to use the webdav so i could access my files away from home. but nas drives such as netgear can also do this right through a website, and various applications. I also pointed my editing mac to a external drive on the server for 1920x1080 video scratch
First, do i stick with the server, or go to the nas system, and will the nas be able to work as a scratch drive.
Second, if i get a nas, which do i get. ive seen some from netgear which so far im leaning towards, and lacie and western digital.
Third, with a nas, does it show up on my mac just like any external hard drive? and is it complicated to set it up to be accessed anywhere in the world.
Lastly, Is it possible to have multiple nas in one house?
As you can probably tell, im new to this stuff.
thanks for the help!

I am using a 3 terabyte NAS, the 'My Book Live' from Western Digital.
The MBL supports Time Machine. I am currently backing up two of my Macs
Via Time Machine and have had no problems.
Jerry

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Lion Server vs NAS

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I am using a 3 terabyte NAS, the 'My Book Live' from Western Digital.
The MBL supports Time Machine. I am currently backing up two of my Macs
Via Time Machine and have had no problems.
Jerry

Share NAS directories on LION Server

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best
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Hi Jonathan,
probably my descripotion is not accurate should, I want to manage the network shares via the server (WGM).
in principle its like this:
OD user logs in, gets his network home folder (on NAS) that synchronizes with the local home folder (all this managed and configured via mobility in WGM).
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-H

Regarding mountain lion server: clients experience intermittent service connections. the server system log has the following error- Client handshake failed (6):113: Server not accepting client connections (any ideas???)

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Hi Jason
I was getting the same behavior after Apple support had me delete some plist files to get Airplay going. I was also getting the following error:
the error occurred while processing a command of type 'writesettings' in the plug-in 'server vpn'
I went into ~/Library/Preferences/ and /Library/Preferences/ and deleted every plist contating the word server. I had to re-set up my server (meaning walk through some intial steps) but all of my settings were still there after that and everything started working again.
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Just purchased a mini server running Lion, and got screen sharing working fine from my legacy system (32-bit so Leopard only). However, I would like to run in multi-user mode, so someone can use the Lion system and another person can access their own account, from the older Leopard system, at the same time. Using multi-user rather than screen sharing. But Leopard does not have the option on the Finder/Share Screen command, the pop-up window to select screen sharing or new virtual session. So, is there a way still to run a new virtual session from a remote client running Leopard? Since the multi-user capability resides on the Lion server, it should be possible, but how, without the pop-up menu?
Message was edited by: Kurt-Syracuse

Hey. I suggest you check out http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9839785#9839785, where there are a couple solutions posted in regard to the error code -36 when connecting to a samba share. Good luck!
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Lion Server 802.1x WLAN System Profile

Hello skilled guys in the community :-)
Today I would need some kind of how-to about configuring Lion clients into a Lion Server 802.1x WLAN network. As I am currently setting everything up from scratch in my home/lab environment here the bits and pieces I have already successfully up and running:
DHCP
DNS
Open Directory Master
Profile Manager
The next I've done is to activate the Radius service in the server which first of all asks me for the certificate. There was only one and this was the one created from the Open Directory wizard. As the root certificate of this certificate should be already installed in managed clients (done by joining to the Profile Manager) workstations should already trust this certificate and there should be no issue.
Question here: Can this certificate be used and am I on the right way or should I create an own certificate for this? Is yes, how?
After many hours of playing around with the radius server and my access point (3COM 9552) I finally got it working and I could connect to my 802.1x network by just providing OD username and password.
Question here: When adding a new radius client there are four fields in the dialog box: Name (should be clear), IP (more than clear), the shared secrect (also not a problem) and the type. As this type is not a drop down field but just a text box I was wondering quite a while what the server expects from me to put in there. I decided to write there 'other' as this was the only option I could find from googling. Is this correct?
As next step I would like to configure a WLAN System profile using Profile Manager. So a WLAN connection which is up even though nobody is logged into the machine.
Question here: Can anybody help me with this. I had a look into this config dialog in Profile Manager but could not get any clue of System Profile and also don't know what else I need to configure there. I also see that I need to configure a name and password but don't understand why I need this. For my understanding the client machines (especially with System Profile) should use there the machine name and password (COMPUTERNAME$) as I created a trusted bind to OD. Or is it rather so that I need to create a dedicated account for WLAN connection with a not expireing password suitable long? What kind of things I have to configure also in there? Trusts, Authentication?
Thank you already for your help. I'm happy to get the Radius authentication now working. Now would be happy getting rid of the rest of the question marks.
Cheers
Robert

Any ideas here??
In profile manager I also saw the option authenticate with computer credentials. I belief for this it's needed to have a trusted bond to OD like I have. But when I configure it (TTLS with computer name and password) WLAN never gets connected.
Any idea on this. Also where can I see that the profile is made as a system profile. The only tick box I've found is for the logon window authentification which is far to late for me to establish any WLAN connection.
Thanks.

System preferences in lion server not responding

My System Preferences iin Lion Server are not responding.
when I try to open any application in the system preferences panel, it never opens
How can I fix this?

Boot with your bootable backup/clone and restore it. If you don't have one, boot with your install disc and restore your Time Machine backup from some point in the past before the problem cropped up. Don't have one of those either? Then, boot with the install disc and reinstall Snow Leopard. That should restore all functionality without mucking with anything else. Then, run Software Update to get to something other than the 10.6 that your profile is showing, namely 10.6.4, the latest version, repair permissions, and restart.

Mountain Lion Server cannot create NetBoot images for earlier systems

I'm trying to create a NetBoot image for OS X Lion on my Mountain Lion Server using System Image Utility, but SIU shows the 10.8 installer as the only available disk for creating an image.
The same 10.7 boot disk is shown as source correctly in Lion Serevr SIU.
Does SIU limits the creation of NetBoot image only for the same OS X version or am I missing something?
Ideas?
Thank you!

Yes. SIU for Mountain Lion only makes images of Mountain Lion.
To make images for Lion, you'll need to download the Server Essentials package for 10.7.5 and install it onto a Lion system.

Lion server file sharing issue with windows API read/write ini file (GetPrivateProfileString)

Hello,
I try to config lion server as file server for a windows application we use at work. All other computers are windows 7 or XP, lion server is the only mac. I choose lion server because it's size, quality and personal love of apple products.
10.7.2 lion server's samba file sharing works almost perfectly with all my windows machines, I can copy, delete, modify any text files or office files without any issue, but the most important windows application for my business doesn't work with samba file sharing. After some digging, I found it is because windows program can't read or write INI file stored on lion share. Windows API GetPrivateProfileString always returns empty if the INI file is store on lion share.
You can download a small application for read/write windows INI file from codeproject.com to test this problem:
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/files/ini.aspx
I can open/edit the in file using any text editor without any problem. The only problem is with those windows APIs. ACL is turned on for my lion share and assigned "delete" rights to samba users.
I install samba3 on the same server; it works perfectly with windows API. My windows program also works. Looks like there is something wrong with lion server's sambax.
I'd prefer to use built-in samba even I have samba3 working. Built-in samba is very immature right now, but considered how young it is, I will give apple some time to make it mature.
Does anyone have same issue or knows how to fix it?
Thanks,
Michael.

All the memory is fine. The server rarely if ever goes down when there are only around 10-12 users connected. When there are 20+ users connected and working heavily it goes down often. When I say working heavily, I mean they are transferring huge files to the SAN (100GB+), sometimes 5 at a time per user, and there are a bunch of others who are reading large video files at a minimum of 220MB/sec from the SAN.
Though this worked on Snow Leopard without any issues, Lion just doesn't seem to be able to handle it. The odd thing is, on Snow Leopard there was only a single 1GB ethernet connection to a NAS system, whereas with Lion we have a much more powerful machine with a 6-port 10GB ethernet card and a 4 lane 8GB fiber card to a true SAN. You would think that the newer scenario with Lion would handle far more users with ease.
So far, very disappointing with regards to Lion's file serving performance.

Lion Server File Sharing Crashes

We have a brand new Mac Pro (12 core with 64GB of RAM) running OS X Lion Server in a corporate environment. The server is running only file sharing and software update servers, and we have around 40 users who need to be connected over AFP at all times. This company runs 24/7 and we have an XSan environment using an ATTO Celerity 8GB 4 channel fiber card (84EN) along with a 6 port 10GB Ethernet card. The Ethernet card is configured in a link aggregation bond using ports 1-4. The idea is that clients who do not have fiber cards installed on their machines can still connect to the SAN via Ethernet and this file server. They AFP connect to the share, and of course the share is the SAN. It's a single mount point and everyone has read/write access.
The issue is that this machine keeps crashing (multiple times per day) and I cannot find any reason why. Syslog shows nothing of value and I've called into Apple Enterprise Support who also brought nothing to the table.
We initially had SMB and AFP file sharing activated but as soon as a Windows 7 client connected the machine was brought down. So, I disabled SMB via terminal (sudo serveradmin stop smb) and deactivated it via the Server app for the share point). That at least allows the machine to be up for 4-6 hours before crashing again.
This is seemingly the simplest of setups for file sharing and I would've thought that this beast of a machine would be able to handle being a file server without issue for far more than 40 clients. I'm seeing high CPU usage, which Apple support told me was perfectly normal (around 60% on the kernel_task process and around 55% on the AppleFileServer process). It also seems to consume all 64GB of memory, though it shows 60GB as inactive, but at the same time it's paging in and out.
Virtually all of the clients are running Lion (10.7.4), the server itself is running 10.7.4. There are a few ethernet connected clients running 10.6 along with two running 10.5. As I mentioned I disabled SMB so there are no Windows computers connecting to this machine at this time (though it would be nice to get that functionality back if AFP can be stabilized).
None of this makes any sense to me and I'm hoping someone can shed some light on this issue. This company simply cannot be down, especially not multiple times per day. The only way to bring things back and running from a crash is to hard boot the machine via the power button as you cannot perform a restart or a shutdown. Once the machine comes back up everything is back to working order for a few more hours until it happens again.

All the memory is fine. The server rarely if ever goes down when there are only around 10-12 users connected. When there are 20+ users connected and working heavily it goes down often. When I say working heavily, I mean they are transferring huge files to the SAN (100GB+), sometimes 5 at a time per user, and there are a bunch of others who are reading large video files at a minimum of 220MB/sec from the SAN.
Though this worked on Snow Leopard without any issues, Lion just doesn't seem to be able to handle it. The odd thing is, on Snow Leopard there was only a single 1GB ethernet connection to a NAS system, whereas with Lion we have a much more powerful machine with a 6-port 10GB ethernet card and a 4 lane 8GB fiber card to a true SAN. You would think that the newer scenario with Lion would handle far more users with ease.
So far, very disappointing with regards to Lion's file serving performance.

How To Install A (Almost) Working Lion Server With Profile Management/SSL/OD/Mail/iCal/Address Book/VNC/Web/etc.

I recently installed a fresh version of Lion Server after attempting to fix a broken upgrade. With some help from others, I've managed to get all the new features working and have kept notes, having found that many or most of the necessary installation steps for both the OS and its services are almost entirely undocumented. When you get them working, they work great, but the entire process is very fragile, with simple setup steps causing breaks or even malicious behaviors. In case this is useful to others, here are my notes.
Start with an erased, virgin, single guid partitioned drive. Not an upgrade. Not simply a repartitioned drive. Erased. Clean. Anything else can and probably will break the Lion Server install, as I discovered myself more than once. Before erasing my drive, I already had Lion and made a Lion install DVD from instructions widely available on the web. I suppose you could also boot into the Lion recovery partition and use disk utility to erase the OS X partition then install a new partition, but I cut a DVD. The bottom line is to erase any old OS partitions. And of course to have multiple, independent backups: I use both Time Machine with a modified StdExclusions.plist and Carbon Copy Cloner.
Also, if you will be running your own personal cloud, you will want to know your domain name ahead of time, as this will be propagated everywhere throughout server, and changing anything related to SSL on Lion Server is a nightmare that I haven't figured out. If you don't yet have a domain name, go drop ten dollars at namecheap.com or wherever and reserve one before you start. Soemday someone will document how to change this stuff without breaking Lion Server, but we're not there yet. I'll assume the top-level domain name "domain.com" here.
Given good backups, a Lion Install DVD (or Recovery Partition), and a domain name, here are the steps, apparently all of which must be more-or-less strictly followed in this order.
DVD>Disk Utility>Erase Disk [or Recovery Partition>Disk Utility>Erase Partition]
DVD>Install Lion
Reboot, hopefully Lion install kicks in
Update, update, update Lion (NOT Lion Server yet) until no more updates
System Preferences>Network>Static IP on the LAN (say 10.0.1.2) and Computer name ("server" is a good standbye)
Terminal>$ sudo scutil --set HostName server.domain.com
App Store>Install Lion Server and run through the Setup
Download install Server Admin Tools, then update, update, update until no more updates
Server Admin>DNS>Zones [IF THIS WASN'T AUTOMAGICALLY CREATED (mine wasn't): Add zone domain.com with Nameserver "server.domain.com." (that's a FQDN terminated with a period) and a Mail Exchanger (MX record) "server.domain.com." with priority 10. Add Record>Add Machine (A record) server.domain.com pointing to the server's static IP. You can add fancier DNS aliases and a simpler MX record below after you get through the crucial steps.]
System Prefs>Network>Advanced>Set your DNS server to 127.0.0.1
A few DNS set-up steps and these most important steps:
A. Check that the Unix command "hostname" returns the correct hostname and you can see this hostname in Server.app>Hardware>Network
B. Check that DNS works: the unix commands "host server.domain.com" and "host 10.0.1.2" (assuming that that's your static IP) should point to each other. Do not proceed until DNS works.
C. Get Apple Push Notification Services CA via Server.app>Hardware>Settings><Click toggle, Edit... get a new cert ...>
D. Server.app>Profile Manager>Configure... [Magic script should create OD Master, signed SSL cert]
E. Server.app>Hardware>Settings>SSL Certificate> [Check to make sure it's set to the one just created]
F. Using Server.app, turn on the web, then Server.app>Profile Manager> [Click on hyperlink to get to web page, e.g. server.domain.com/profilemanager] Upper RHS pull-down, install Trust Profile
G. Keychain Access>System>Certificates [Find the automatically generated cert "Domain", the one that is a "Root certificate authority", Highlight and Export as .cer, email to all iOS devices, and click on the authority on the device. It should be entered as a trusted CA on all iOS devices. While you're at it, highlight and Export... as a .cer the certificate "IntermediateCA_SERVER.DOMAIN.COM_1", which is listed an an "Intermediate CA" -- you will use this to establish secure SSL connections with remote browsers hitting your server.]
H. iOS on LAN: browse to server.domain.com/mydevices> [click on LHS Install trust cert, then RHS Enroll device.
I. Test from web browser server.domain.com/mydevices: Lock Device to test
J. ??? Profit
12. Server Admin>DNS>Zones> Add convenient DNS alias records if necessary, e.g., mail.domain.com, smtp.domain.com, www.domain.com. If you want to refer to your box using the convenient shorthand "domain.com", you must enter the A record (NOT alias) "domain.com." FQDN pointing to the server's fixed IP. You can also enter the convenient short MX record "domain.com." with priority 11. This will all work on the LAN -- all these settings must be mirrored on the outside internet using the service from which you registered domain.com.
You are now ready to begin turning on your services. Here are a few important details and gotchas setting up cloud services.
Firewall
Server Admin>Firewall>Services> Open up all ports needed by whichever services you want to run and set up your router (assuming that your server sits behind a router) to port forward these ports to your router's LAN IP. This is most a straightforward exercise in grepping for the correct ports on this page, but there are several jaw-droppingly undocumented omissions of crucial ports for Push Services and Device Enrollment. If you want to enroll your iOS devices, make sure port 1640 is open. If you want Push Notifications to work (you do), then ports 2195, 2196, 5218, and 5223 must be open. The Unix commands "lsof -i :5218" and "nmap -p 5218 server.domain.com" (nmap available from Macports after installing Xcode from the App Store) help show which ports are open.
SSH
Do this with strong security. Server.app to turn on remote logins (open port 22), but edit /etc/sshd_config to turn off root and password logins.
PermitRootLogin no
PasswordAuthentication no
ChallengeResponseAuthentication no
I'm note sure if toggling the Allow remote logins will load this config file or, run "sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/org.openbsd.ssh-agent.plist ; sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/org.openbsd.ssh-agent.plist" to restart the server's ssh daemon.
Then use ssh-keygen on remote client to generate public/private keys that can be used to remotely login to the server.
client$ ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 2048 -C client_name
[Securely copy ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub from client to server.]
server$ cat id_rsa.pub > ~/.ssh/known_hosts
I also like DenyHosts, which emails detected ssh attacks to [email protected]. It's amazing how many ssh attacks there are on any open port 22. Not really an added security feature if you've turned off password logins, but good to monitor. Here's a Lion Server diff for the config file /usr/share/denyhosts:
$ diff denyhosts.cfg-dist denyhosts.cfg
12c12
< SECURE_LOG = /var/log/secure
> #SECURE_LOG = /var/log/secure
22a23
> SECURE_LOG = /var/log/secure.log
34c35
< HOSTS_DENY = /etc/hosts.deny
> #HOSTS_DENY = /etc/hosts.deny
40a42,44
> #
> # Mac OS X Lion Server
> HOSTS_DENY = /private/etc/hosts.deny
195c199
< LOCK_FILE = /var/lock/subsys/denyhosts
> #LOCK_FILE = /var/lock/subsys/denyhosts
202a207,208
> LOCK_FILE = /var/denyhosts/denyhosts.pid
> #
219c225
< ADMIN_EMAIL =
> ADMIN_EMAIL = [email protected]
286c292
< #SYSLOG_REPORT=YES
> SYSLOG_REPORT=YES
Network Accounts
User Server.app to create your network accounts; do not use Workgroup Manager. If you use Workgroup Manager, as I did, then your accounts will not have email addresses specified and iCal Server WILL NOT COMPLETELY WORK. Well, at least collaboration through network accounts will be handled clunkily through email, not automatically as they should. If you create a network account using Workgroup Manager, then edit that account using Server.app to specify the email to which iCal invitations may be sent. Server.app doesn't say anything about this, but that's one thing that email address entry is used for. This still isn't quite solid on Lion Server, as my Open Directory logs on a freshly installed Lion Server are filled with errors that read:
2011-12-12 15:05:52.425 EST - Module: SystemCache - Misconfiguration detected in hash 'Kerberos':
     User 'uname' (/LDAPv3/127.0.0.1) - ID 1031 - UUID 98B4DF30-09CF-42F1-6C31-9D55FE4A0812 - SID S-0-8-83-8930552043-0845248631-7065481045-9092
Oh well.
Email
Email aliases are handled with the file /private/etc/postfix/aliases. Do something like this
root:           myname
admin:          myname
sysadmin:       myname
certadmin:      myname
webmaster:      myname
my_alternate:   myname
Then run "sudo newaliases". If your ISP is Comcast or some other large provider, you probably must proxy your outgoing mail through their SMTP servers to avoid being blocked as a spammer (a lot of SMTP servers will block email from Comcast/whatever IP addresses that isn't sent by Comcast). Use Server.app>Mail to enter your account information. Even then, the Lion Server default setup may fail using this proxy. I had to do this with the file /private/etc/postfix/main.cf:
cd /etc/postfix
sudo cp ./main.cf ./main.cf.no_smtp_sasl_security_options
sudo echo 'smtp_sasl_security_options = noanonymous' >> ./main.cf
sudo serveradmin stop mail
sudo serveradmin start mail
Finally, make sure that you're running a blacklisting srevice yourself! Server Admin>Mail>Filter> Use spamhaus.org as a blacklister. Finally, set up mail to use strong Kerberos/MD5 settings under on Server Admin>Mail>Advanced. Turn off password and clear logins. The settings should be set to "Use" your SSL cert, NOT "Require". "Require" consistently breaks things for me.
If you already installed the server's Trust Certificate as described above (and opened up the correct ports), email to your account should be pushed out to all clients.
iCal Server
Server.app>Calendar>Turn ON and Allow Email Invitations, Edit... . Whatever you do, do NOT enter your own email account information in this GUI. You must enter the account information for local user com.apple.calendarserver, and the password for this account, which is stored in the System keychain: Keychain Access>System> Item com.apple.servermgr_calendar. Double-click and Show Password, copy and paste into Server.app dialog. This is all described in depth here. If you enter your own account information here (DO NOT!), the iCal Server will delete all Emails in your Inbox just as soon as it reads them, exactly like it works for user com.apple.calendarserver. Believe me, you don't want to discover this "feature", which I expect will be more tightly controlled in some future update.
Web
The functionality of Server.app's Web management is pretty limited and awful, but a few changes to the file /etc/apache2/httpd.conf will give you a pretty capable and flexible web server, just one that you must manage by hand. Here's a diff for httpd.conf:
$ diff httpd.conf.default httpd.conf
95c95
< #LoadModule ssl_module libexec/apache2/mod_ssl.so
> LoadModule ssl_module libexec/apache2/mod_ssl.so
111c111
< #LoadModule php5_module libexec/apache2/libphp5.so
> LoadModule php5_module libexec/apache2/libphp5.so
139,140c139,140
< #LoadModule auth_digest_apple_module libexec/apache2/mod_auth_digest_apple.so
< #LoadModule encoding_module libexec/apache2/mod_encoding.so
> LoadModule auth_digest_apple_module libexec/apache2/mod_auth_digest_apple.so
> LoadModule encoding_module libexec/apache2/mod_encoding.so
146c146
< #LoadModule xsendfile_module libexec/apache2/mod_xsendfile.so
> LoadModule xsendfile_module libexec/apache2/mod_xsendfile.so
177c177
< ServerAdmin [email protected]
> ServerAdmin [email protected]
186c186
< #ServerName www.example.com:80
> ServerName domain.com:443
677a678,680
> # Server-specific configuration
> # sudo apachectl -D WEBSERVICE_ON -D MACOSXSERVER -k restart
> Include /etc/apache2/mydomain/*.conf
I did "sudo mkdir /etc/apache2/mydomain" and add specific config files for various web pages to host. For example, here's a config file that will host the entire contents of an EyeTV DVR, all password controlled with htdigest ("htdigest ~uname/.htdigest EyeTV uname"). Browsing to https://server.domain.com/eyetv points to /Users/uname/Sites/EyeTV, in which there's an index.php script that can read and display the EyeTV archive at https://server.domain.com/eyetv_archive. If you want Apache username accounts with twiddles as in https://server.domain.com/~uname, specify "UserDir Sites" in the configuration file.
Alias /eyetv /Users/uname/Sites/EyeTV
<Directory "/Users/uname/Sites/EyeTV">
    AuthType Digest
    AuthName "EyeTV"
    AuthUserFile /Users/uname/.htdigest
    AuthGroupFile /dev/null
    Require user uname
    Options Indexes MultiViews
    AllowOverride All
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
</Directory>
Alias /eyetv_archive "/Volumes/Macintosh HD2/Documents/EyeTV Archive"
<Directory "/Volumes/Macintosh HD2/Documents/EyeTV Archive">
    AuthType Digest
    AuthName "EyeTV"
    AuthUserFile /Users/uname/.htdigest
    AuthGroupFile /dev/null
    Require user uname
    Options Indexes MultiViews
    AllowOverride All
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
</Directory>
I think you can turn Web off/on in Server.app to relaunch apached, or simply "sudo apachectl -D WEBSERVICE_ON -D MACOSXSERVER -k restart".
Securely copy to all desired remote clients the file IntermediateCA_SERVER.DOMAIN.COM_1.cer, which you exported from System Keychain above. Add this certificate to your remote keychain and trust it, allowing secure connections between remote clients and your server. Also on remote clients: Firefox>Advanced>Encryption>View Certificates>Authorities>Import...> Import this certificate into your browser. Now there should be a secure connection to https://server.domain.com without any SSL warnings.
One caveat is that there should be a nice way to establish secure SSL to https://domain.com and https://www.domain.com, but the automagically created SSL certificate only knows about server.domain.com. I attempted to follow this advice when I originally created the cert and add these additional domains (under "Subject Alternate Name Extension"), but the cert creation UI failed when I did this, so I just gave up. I hope that by the time these certs expire, someone posts some documentation on how to manage and change Lion Server SSL scripts AFTER the server has been promoted to an Open Directory Master. In the meantime, it would be much appreciated if anyone can post either how to add these additional domain names to the existing cert, or generate and/or sign a cert with a self-created Keychain Access root certificate authority. In my experience, any attempt to mess with the SSL certs automatically generated just breaks Lion Server.
Finally, if you don't want a little Apple logo as your web page icon, create your own 16×16 PNG and copy it to the file /Library/Server/Web/Data/Sites/Default/favicon.ico. And request that all web-crawling robots go away with the file /Library/Server/Web/Data/Sites/Default/robots.txt:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /
Misc
VNC easily works with iOS devices -- use a good passphrase. Edit /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postgresql.postgres.plist and set "listen_addresses=127.0.0.1" to allow PostgreSQL connections over localhost. I've also downloaded snort/base/swatch to build an intrusion detection system, and used Macports's squid+privoxy to build a privacy-enhanced ad-blocking proxy server.

Privacy Enhancing Filtering Proxy and SSH Tunnel
Lion Server comes with its own web proxy, but chaining Squid and Privoxy together provides a capable and effective web proxy that can block ads and malicious scripts, and conceal information used to track you around the web. I've posted a simple way to build and use a privacy enhancing web proxy here. While you're at it, configure your OS and browsers to block Adobe Flash cookies and block Flash access to your camera, microphone, and peer networks. Read this WSJ article series to understand how this impacts your privacy. If you configure it to allow use for anyone on your LAN, be sure to open up ports 3128, 8118, and 8123 on your firewall.
If you've set up ssh and/or VPN as above, you can securely tunnel in to your proxy from anywhere. The syntax for ssh tunnels is a little obscure, so I wrote a little ssh tunnel script with a simpler flexible syntax. This script also allows secure tunnels to other services like VNC (port 5900). If you save this to a file ./ssht (and chmod a+x ./ssht), example syntax to establish an ssh tunnel through localhost:8080 (or, e.g., localhost:5901 for secure VNC Screen Sharing connects) looks like:
$ ./ssht 8080:[email protected]:3128
$ ./ssht 8080:alice@:
$ ./ssht 8080:
$ ./ssht 8018::8123
$ ./ssht 5901::5900 [Use the address localhost:5901 for secure VNC connects using OS X's Screen Sharing or Chicken of the VNC (sudo port install cotvnc)]
$ vi ./ssht
#!/bin/sh
# SSH tunnel to squid/whatever proxy: ssht [-p ssh_port] [localhost_port:][user_name@][ip_address][:remotehost][:remote_port]
USERNAME_DEFAULT=username
HOSTNAME_DEFAULT=domain.com
SSHPORT_DEFAULT=22
# SSH port forwarding specs, e.g. 8080:localhost:3128
LOCALHOSTPORT_DEFAULT=8080      # Default is http proxy 8080
REMOTEHOST_DEFAULT=localhost    # Default is localhost
REMOTEPORT_DEFAULT=3128         # Default is Squid port
# Parse ssh port and tunnel details if specified
SSHPORT=$SSHPORT_DEFAULT
TUNNEL_DETAILS=$LOCALHOSTPORT_DEFAULT:$USERNAME_DEFAULT@$HOSTNAME_DEFAULT:$REMOT EHOST_DEFAULT:$REMOTEPORT_DEFAULT
while [ "$1" != "" ]
do
case $1
in
    -p) shift;                  # -p option
        SSHPORT=$1;
        shift;;
     *) TUNNEL_DETAILS=$1;      # 1st argument option
        shift;;
esac
done
# Get local and remote ports, username, and hostname from the command line argument: localhost_port:user_name@ip_address:remote_host:remote_port
shopt -s extglob                        # needed for +(pattern) syntax; man sh
LOCALHOSTPORT=$LOCALHOSTPORT_DEFAULT
USERNAME=$USERNAME_DEFAULT
HOSTNAME=$HOSTNAME_DEFAULT
REMOTEHOST=$REMOTEHOST_DEFAULT
REMOTEPORT=$REMOTEPORT_DEFAULT
# LOCALHOSTPORT
CDR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS#+([0-9]):}         # delete shortest leading +([0-9]):
CAR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS%%$CDR}             # cut this string from TUNNEL_DETAILS
CAR=${CAR%:}                            # delete :
if [ "$CAR" != "" ]                     # leading or trailing port specified
then
    LOCALHOSTPORT=$CAR
fi
TUNNEL_DETAILS=$CDR
# REMOTEPORT
CDR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS%:+([0-9])}         # delete shortest trailing :+([0-9])
CAR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS##$CDR}             # cut this string from TUNNEL_DETAILS
CAR=${CAR#:}                            # delete :
if [ "$CAR" != "" ]                     # leading or trailing port specified
then
    REMOTEPORT=$CAR
fi
TUNNEL_DETAILS=$CDR
# REMOTEHOST
CDR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS%:*}                # delete shortest trailing :*
CAR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS##$CDR}             # cut this string from TUNNEL_DETAILS
CAR=${CAR#:}                            # delete :
if [ "$CAR" != "" ]                     # leading or trailing port specified
then
    REMOTEHOST=$CAR
fi
TUNNEL_DETAILS=$CDR
# USERNAME
CDR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS#*@}                # delete shortest leading +([0-9]):
CAR=${TUNNEL_DETAILS%%$CDR}             # cut this string from TUNNEL_DETAILS
CAR=${CAR%@}                            # delete @
if [ "$CAR" != "" ]                     # leading or trailing port specified
then
    USERNAME=$CAR
fi
TUNNEL_DETAILS=$CDR
# HOSTNAME
HOSTNAME=$TUNNEL_DETAILS
if [ "$HOSTNAME" == "" ]                # no hostname given
then
    HOSTNAME=$HOSTNAME_DEFAULT
fi
ssh -p $SSHPORT -L $LOCALHOSTPORT:$REMOTEHOST:$REMOTEPORT -l $USERNAME $HOSTNAME -f -C -q -N \
    && echo "SSH tunnel established via $LOCALHOSTPORT:$REMOTEHOST:$REMOTEPORT\n\tto $USERNAME@$HOSTNAME:$SSHPORT." \
    || echo "SSH tunnel FAIL."

I am trying to allow guests on windows to connect to shares on my Lion server but it keeps asking for a password for guest. I have allow guest users to access this share enabled but it still does not work.

I am trying to allow guests on windows to connect to shares on my Lion server but it keeps asking for a password for guest. I have allow guest users to access this share enabled but it still does not work.

Ditto. Guest accounts shouldn't have a password. No way to enter one in System Prefs...

How can I configure Lion server to accept inbound VPN (L2TP) connections while connected as client to another vpn service?

I have what I believe to be a unique need;
I have a MacPro (1,1) running Lion with Server app.
I require that this particular machine be connected as a client to a VPN server, while at the same time acting as a VPN server for my network.
The PPTP connection configuration is such that "Send all traffic over VPN connection" is checked.
If PPTP client is NOT connected, I can connect to Lion as VPN server. As soon as I make the connection from Lion as a client, I can no longer
connect to Lion VPN server.
I understand this is because I am forcing all traffic out the virtual interface (tun0) and eth0 is no longer listening on the local network.
1. Is it possible to bind the VPN client (on Lion Server) to a particular interface? If I could tell the PPTP client to only use eth1 as the interface of choice, my assumption would be that eth0 would then be free to accept incoming connections.
2. Is it possible to bind the VPN service (on Lion Server) to a particular interface? if I could tell the vpn serviec to only listen on eth1, and in turn tell the PPTP client to NOT communicate on eth1 but only eth0 then perhaps I could separate the communications?
In my head, it seems as though both of the above options would be required in order to use Lion as both a VPN server and VPN client
Any and all help appreciated.

This is a standard facet of most VPNs - the problem lies in your NAT router since both clients appear to come from the same IP address as far as the VPN server is concerned, and the router can't separate out the traffic.
There are a couple of solutions.
First, the built-in VPN server supports L2TP and PPTP protocols. You should be able to connect one system under each protocol, so that gets your two machines connected.
Second, you can replace your NAT router with one that supports multiple VPN clients (often termed 'VPN passthrough').
Third, setup a site-to-site tunnel so that your entire LAN is connected to the VPN (this saves you from having to run a separate VPN client on each machine, but is typically only worth it when you have more machines).

How can FTP users access my NAS system via FTP client?

I recently purchased a 2 bay, 4TB Buffalo Link Station DUO in order to solve some FTP issues. I have about 50 users outside my LAN that need to connect drop files on my NAS, however nobody seems able to connect via FTP client. If they login using the Web Access Dynamic DNS address they can read and write via their web browser, but it's clunky and slow.
My NAS system has been given the IP adress of 192.168.1.254 which seem to me that it's a local IP adress, not a public/static IP. Do I need to manually assign an IP adress to my NAS system in order fot users to log into that specific IP and go directly to the shared folders on the NAS system?
Thanks in advance!

Your NAS is getting that IP because it is behind your Router, which is the normal way to use it and as it should be.
You can not ASSIGN a public IP you your NAS. Only your ISP can do that and usually that incures an extra cost for more than 1 Public IP address. Usually included with a Business account and most of the time only available with a Business account. ISP do not want home owners running FTP or Mail servers on a residential acounts.
As noted you have to forward the noraml FTP port, port 21, in your Router to the IP of the NAS. Since you already have that port forwarded to your Mac, which I have no idea why you did that, you have to either change that port forwarding to the NAS IP or make the FTP server on the NAS respond to some other port and forward that on the router to the IP of the NAS. The to access the NAS FTP server you have to enter the piblic IP address of your router followed with a :and port #. XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX:22 or whatever port # you assign to the FTP server on the NAS.

Lion Server vs NAS System

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