Multiple Home Directories

I have a OD server running 10.5.2 and and 10.5.2 file server that is a member of the OD. I am curious if this is possible:
I'd like local home directories for all of the computers (which i currently have set up in WGM by setting the home dirs to /Users. But what i'd also like is for them to have a network home directory that they can save files to for personal use. Right now i have the share set up so that there is a folder called /Users on the file server and i'd like any folder in there to be able to be mounted by doing afp://server/username
are having both of these at the same time possible?

This was my point. I wanted total separation. In order to create that separation (when trying to use a network user) I had to temporarily move the existing Snow Leopard Users folder (on Partition 1) so that the Partition 2 OS (either Snow leopard or LION) will create it's own User directory structure. This is only needed for network users (i.e. ones that authenticate via OSX server).
Once the process of temporarily moving the Users folder, letting the new instance create it's own directories, and renaming back, everything works. i.e. when I startup Snowleopard all operations are within Partition 1 then if I start LION all operations are within Partition 2.
When installing new versions of an O/S I like to have control and manage the change so that I know I have a totally working system. Been doing the same with Linux for years, but Mac OS/X tries to be a bit too clever!

Similar Messages

Multiple simutaneously logged in users accessing AFP home directories?

Hi,
Many of our problems are described in this guy's blog:
http://alblue.blogspot.com/2006/08/rantmac-migrating-from-afp-to-nfs.html
The basic capability we want is to have multiple simultaneously logged in users to have access to their AFP mounted home directory, which is configured in a sane, out-of-the box setup using WGM and Server Admin.
Multiple user access could take the form of FUS (fast user switching), or simply allowing a user to SSH into a machine that another user is already logged into and expect to be able to manipulate the contents of her home directory.
From my extensive searches, I have no reason to believe this is currently possible with 10.4 Server and AFP.
(here's the official word from apple: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25581)
I've read that using NFS home directories will work, though.
I want to believe that Apple has a solution for this by now (it's been almost a year since we first had difficulty), or at least a sanctioned workaround. If Apple doesn't have one, maybe someone else has come up with something clever. I find it hard to believe that more people haven't wanted this capability! (not being able to easily search the discussion boards doesn't help, though...)
Thanks for your help!
Adam

Parallels Issue. Track at http://forum.parallels.com/showthread.php?p=135585

How to configure Airport Extreme AFP disk sharing to host multiple users' home-directories (Lion, using autofs)

I have this working, but only by completely bypassing access control, using guest access with read+write permissions.
Do I need to buy Lion Server, to do this. All my past unix/linux experience says Lion Server should _not_ be necessary.
This seems like a simple & obvious setup objective, but it is proving to be harder than I would imagine.
Setup:
multiple users, sharing two mac mini's running OSX Lion
connected to an Airport Extreme (4th gen) with a USB disk shared (either via disk password, AEBS password, or using AEBS user's passwords).
After much experimentation and web research, I finally have managed to get the mini's to auto mount the Airport Extreme's AFP shared USB disk. Well almost... It only works if, on the Airport, I set the guest access permissions to read+write and select the "Secure Shared Disks" method to "With disk password" or "with Airport Extreme password". In other words, it only works if I essentially bypass/disable access control by using the guest authentication mechanism to the AFP shared disk.
On the Lion side of this, I am automounting the users directories via "autofs". The config files for this are
/etc/auto_master:
# Automounter master map
+auto_master            # Use directory service
/net                    -hosts          -nobrowse,hidefromfinder,nosuid
/home                   auto_home       -nobrowse,hidefromfinder
/Network/Servers        -fstab
/-                      -static
/-                      auto_afp
/etc/auto_afp:
# Automounter AFP master map
# https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3336384?start=0&tstart=0
/afp/users -fstype=afp afp://;AUTH=No%20User%[email protected]/Users/
Then, after rebooting and verifying read+write access to the /afp/users directories, I change each user's home directory: In System Preferences > System > Users & Groups, I right-click over the users to access the Advanced Options, changing the Home directory field to point at the AFP-mounted /afp/users/Users/* home directories.
I experimented with alternate UAM specifications, as well as both OSX and AESB users & passwords. Using guest access is the only thing that has worked.
Any pointers would be appreciated...

Based on lots more experimentation which confirms the information in a parallel discussion (cf. Automount share as non ROOT or SYSTEM user! https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3221944), I have concluded that the Lion 10.7.2 implementation of AutoFS mechanism is broken. I submitted a bug report via apple.com/feedback.
Work arounds..?
Earlier I wondered if installing Lion OSX Server was necessary. The more I contemplate this, the more I am convinced it _should_not_ be necessary. The client-server architecture is clear: my mac's are the file-server client's and the Airport Extreme is supposed to act as the file server. The only thing instaling Lion Server would do (besides enriching Apple.com) is enable me to configure one of the mac's as the file server. This would require it to be "always on" (thus enriching my electric utility as wel). Okay, an additional benefit would be configuring software RAID disks attached to the Lion server, but Time Machine has worked fine for me in the past, backing up to disks mounted on the Airport Extreme.
One solution is to create a disk partition for each user and instruct each user to connect / authenticate to the Airport Extreme AFP share at login. The multiplicity of partitions is necessary since the first user to mount the AFP share, takes ownership of it, blocking other users from accessing that disk partition. A user can "steal" ownership by reconnecting, but this will leave the other user's applications & open files dangling.
This disfunctional situation really *****. Before instaling Lion, I put a 64 GB SSD (solid state disk) in each of our mac's. I did this expecting to easily configure the /Users/* data on external networked storage. I'm having a dejavu "Bill Gates"-ware moment; problems like this were why I abandoned Windoz.
I will make a few more experiments using the depreciated /etc/fstab mechanism. Maybe that will bypass the broken-ness of AutoFS...? Alternately, I guess I could also try to run Kerberos authentication to bypass whatever is broken in AutoFS, but that would require a running a Kerberos daemon somewhere. Possibly I could configure a Kerberos service to run on both my mac's (without installing Apple's Lion Server)...?
Stay tuned...

Replication of home directories in multiple locations

Hi,
We have setup a test AD domain with the master domain controller in our main site.
In each site (country) we have an additional domain controller.
In those sites there are multiple people which will travel to other sites. The login will not be a problem because the sysvol folder which is replicated by default.
But what about the home directories? I saw something about replicating the home directories to each site. This means the servers will have lots of data? On our current linux servers only one site has 1 TB on data.... this seems to be undo able for us if
we need to replicate all of it.... Some users travel a lot between sites, some only 2 times a year...
Could somebody clear this out for me how i should manage this.
Thanks in advance.
Kr,
Joeri

Hi,
The home folder is configured by an administrator by typing its full path, you can change the home folder by specifying another shared folder.
In addition, if there is no network connectivity issue, the user will be able to reach its home folder via LAN or WAN.
More information for you:
How to assign a home folder to a user
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/816313/en-us
Best Regards,
Amy

Problem changing the location of multiple users home directories...

I've just set up a new entry level model iMac for my Mum. Without getting into a discussion about the benefits or otherwise of doing so, I partitioned the hard disk into two with the first partition for the system and the second a scratch disk for files etc. I set up two users, one for my Mum and one for my younger brother. I then copied the users folder across to the scratch disk and in advanced options in the users list set each account's home folder to the relevant user on the scratch disk. This is the same set up as I have on my own system and with which I have no problems and which runs well and cleanly. I have only one account on my system. However on the iMac, the second user (my brother) is unable to write to the new home directory. Downloads don't work and preferences including right click for magic mouse, dock etc are forgotten instantly. It seems there's a permissions issue.
I've set the machine up this way in order to keep all their files separate from the system after their last Mac got very bogged down. I expected it to work in exactly the same way as my own. Does anyone know how to successfuly set up both user accounts in this way?
Any advice would be much appreciated...
Message was edited by: Jimmy Hat
Message was edited by: Jimmy Hat

Jimmy Hat wrote:
I've just set up a new entry level model iMac for my Mum. Without getting into a discussion about the benefits or otherwise of doing so,
still not advisable though IMO.
I partitioned the hard disk into two with the first partition for the system and the second a scratch disk for files etc. I set up two users, one for my Mum and one for my younger brother. I then copied the users folder across to the scratch disk and in advanced options in the users list set each account's home folder to the relevant user on the scratch disk. This is the same set up as I have on my own system and with which I have no problems and which runs well and cleanly. I have only one account on my system. However on the iMac, the second user (my brother) is unable to write to the new home directory. Downloads don't work and preferences including right click for magic mouse, dock etc are forgotten instantly. It seems there's a permissions issue.
how exactly did you copy the home directories? did you do it using drag and drop in finder from one account? then the copied home directories both are owned by that account and the permissions need to be changed. please clarify if that's what you did.
I've set the machine up this way in order to keep all their files separate from the system after their last Mac got very bogged down. I expected it to work in exactly the same way as my own. Does anyone know how to successfuly set up both user accounts in this way?
Any advice would be much appreciated...
Message was edited by: Jimmy Hat
Message was edited by: Jimmy Hat

Home Directories Remote Access

Hi,
As a school we are looking to give students access to their home directories from anywhere (preferably with easy access from tablet devices). We have an on-premise SharePoint Server (2013), and also students have access to Office 365 which could give
them 25GB areas on OneDrive for Business.
The three possibilities I can think of so far (without spending anymore money as budgets are tight, and I am a great believer in using the in-built capabilities of Microsoft Products before outsourcing to 3rd Parties).
Students have user areas on OneDrive for Business in Office 365
This would be great in a way because the files are stored off site freeing space up on our SAN. But with no ability to make our own backups (can get around this using versioning), our main issue would be the 500MB-1GB art/music files our students generate,
opening and saving these across the Internet would be painful, and although chances are they won't need these at home, I don't want to confuse matters by giving them multiple areas to save things. Although it's great that it also integrates with office
when they sign in at home or in school, I find it annoying that it creates a SharePoint folder alongside the already existing OneDrive area (very confusing for end users). When you click this and then on the OneDrive @ Company Name it gives you
access to Style Library and other config folders as well as Documents (just looks messy to me). It also means students would have to use web pages to open anything other than office files, I have mapped network drives to OneDrive
before and it works but is glitchy when clicking through folder structures. I also don't want to have to sync their files to every workstation they log onto to make the OneDrive for Business shortcut appear in file explorer.
Students have user areas on OneDrive for Business on-premise
This solves the speed problem with large files to an extent although saving large files into SharePoint inevitably takes longer. We would still have the messy menu with opening office files (explained above) and the issue with opening other
files via web pages.
Students keep user areas in a directory on our server, using Work Folders to access remotely
After the issues when looking at OneDrive, Work Folders was a ray of light I was hoping would solve the issues. Keep the existing folder structure but give access from anywhere (with the promised apps for IOS, android and windows devices). I
set it up and looked good, until I realised you HAVE to sync all of your files to every device you use them with. So if they're at home on an 16GB iPad for example, their user area is 3GB and they only have 1GB left, they can't access their documents
at all. Sync would be great as an option, but there is no way for them to simply access their directory at home (even via web page).
Please someone tell me there is a way! (Without spending more money).
Thanks,
Andy

Hi Andy,
Thanks for contacting Microsoft.
From you description, I learnt that the issue you are experiencing is that you want to give students access to their home directories from anywhere without spending more money.
If I misunderstand anything, please feel free to contact me.
I have read all the three possibilities. For the first two possibilities, you had better post them to SharePoint forum. For the third possibilities, you are right, syncing up is really an issue.
So for this issue, I need to discuss it with our discussion team. I will update you on this as soon as we can.
Best regards,
Sophia Sun
Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

LDAP Users & Home Directories

Hello, any help would be much appreciated on this one!
I have a Dual 2.3Ghz Xserve G5 running OSX Server 10.4.9 with a 700Gb Xserve RAID. All users home directories are stored on the RAID. I had 1361 users on the LDAP Open Directory system and all was running perfectly. I tried to add another 10 users, all added fine into Workgroup Manager, but I was then getting "User already Logged In" messages, when the users were not logged in. If I turn on "multiple logins" the user can login but the home directory is not created!! Is this a limitation of LDAP OD? A problem with the OS and the Finder not handling more than 1361 directories??? Any help would be excellent!!!!!!
Dual 2.3Ghz G5 Xserve & Xserve RAID Mac OS X (10.4.9) Latest updates installed!

Hi
Wow! I wonder what the load on the CPU would be?
I’ve read somewhere that OSX Server as an Open Directory Master can host up to 10,000 users and by implication – you would assume – the same amount of home folders.
What you’ve got ask yourself is whether the network can cope with that amount of users? If you have the budget you should really be looking to balance the load with more than one server, probably 3 at the least. One to run DNS and DHCP Services, another to run Open Directory and another to run simple file services such as AFP, Windows, Print etc. It would be a good idea in the environment you describe to think about a fallover (replica) server also.

Portable Home Directories in 10.8 Server?

I have a Mac mini Server running 10.6.8. Now that 10.8 is out, Apple will probably stop supporting 10.6 (as is their policy) and that means either slowly eroding security or moving to 10.8. I have been looking at the documentation and it seems underneath it all is still by an large the same basic unix-stuff like postfix, dovecot, a dns system, etc. Giving the lack of support for GUI-managing the more complex setups, I'll probably be doing it command-line (stuff like multiple virtual mail domains, multiple web domains, etc.). Not fun (and a business opportunity for some enterprising software engineer).
But what I haven't been able to see in the documentation or anywhere else is Portable Home Directories. In my current setup, I have a 10.6.8 Server and 10.7 clients. On these clients is a single local administrator acocunt and the rest are 'managed mobile accounts'. These are local acocunts. They work when away form the network on which the server is, but when in range of the server, the server may push settings and stuff. And on login/logout and when connected to the LAN and during work, the home directory of the user is constantly synchronized with a copy of the user's home directory on the server. This means my users can take any computer and get their own account and a synchronized copy of their home directory. They can also take a laptop off line for a while and when they return to my LAN (either physically or by VPN), any changes will be synced. This is a sweet setup and it works with 10.7 clients and 10.6.8 server.
But what I haven't been able to find if this will still work with 10.8 Server. I have looked at teh 10.8 Server documentation and haven't found anything about it. Will it still work somehow and if not, is there a good alternative?

Gerben Wierda wrote:
Or: you create the users anew in the network directory, you replace their home directories with the content of what is on the MacBook (TDM is your friend) and do the chmod. Easier still.
That way, I suggest the migration in that way; because, you can test everything out before the data gets moved over. There's nothing like something going wrong in the setup/migration, and you have to do it all over again.
Kirk, you can always put the Home directories/folder on an external. But if you do, you'll probably want to run this command in Terminal:
sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/autodiskmount AutomountDisksWithoutUserLogin -bool YES
That sets the system-wide setting to mount external HDs on startup. The default behavior in OS X, probably around 10.3 onward (but Apple may have flip-flopped on this), is to mount externals on user GUI-login, not on startup like internal HDs. The default behavior is a huge problem with network users, whose home directories reside on the external, since the external on GUI login often mounts "too late" and new "phantom" home directories are created (along with warning messages that the home directory can't be found) and you sometimes get duplicate mount points. In short, the default behavior creates a bit of mess. To spare you some frustration, run that command, which will mount the externals on startup, so the home folders are always available.
It's also handy if you plan on creating other shares on the external; it prevents some flaky behavior.
Gerben's "general description" can be applied to Lion and Mountain Lion, although with Mountain Lion you have fewer tools, and you'll often be working in Server.app rather than some of the older tools like Server Admin.
Again, basically you need to:
(1) Setup file sharing, where you designate a directory/folder as a share to hold the network home directories. On the default install, Apple makes /Users a share, and you could (similar to what Gerben did) use that to hold not only local accounts' but also the network accounts' home directories. In that setup all users' home directories reside in the same place. All you have to do then is check the box "Make available for home directories over" and leave "AFP". See below; note the very last checkbox; that needs to be checked:
I preferred to keep the local and network users separate, so I actually use a different share for the network users, and not /Users. If you go that route, pay attention to the permissions, it's somewhat easy to get them wrong. I think I cheated and used Carbon Copy Cloner to clone the /Users directory to another HD, then just renamed the directory. FYI you're actually not seeing this in these screen shots, since I'm using a "fresh install" virtual machine to make the screen shots.
Also if you don't need it, I'd probably uncheck "Share with Windows clients (SMB).
2. You need to setup Open Directory, so you can manage Network Users. Since you want portable home directories, then you might consider using Profile Manager (introduced in Lion Server), which is Apple's latest tool for that. You can also download separate Workgroup Manager as well. Not sure which is better, or exactly why there are both. I think the documention indicated for older pre-Lion OSes, Workgroup Manager is still around.
2a - If you go straight to Profile Manager, and set it up, it will first make you setup Open Directory, then the rest of the setup for Profile Manager itself.
2b - Or you can always "two-step", first setup Open Directory, then later if you want "Profile Manager".
3. Once you have OD (step 2), and the share setup for network home directories (step), you use Server.app to create the network users, and assign their home directory to the share not local. Note the entry "Home Folder"; use the pull-down menu to select your share. See below.
If you forget to set the Home Folder, you can always "edit" the user and change the Home Folder to the share, and not Local Only.
4. To get portable Home directories, I'm pretty sure you're going to have to setup and activate Profile Manager or use Workgroup Manager. Sorry not much details I can provide there, I've only played with it a bit, and was planning on upgrading my MacBook Pro to Mountain Lion before giving it a go again.

Need Help setting up "Network Home Directories" or Something Similar

Alright so, I am sure the answer to my question exists but I have no idea what i am looking for as far as syntax is concerned. I have taken over as tech at a full mac School and have not touched a mac before in my life. I will try my best to give a detailed description without an entire life story.
My school has 10.4 on laptops which we run a script on to bind to a directory allowing them to access accounts created on our server. That part works fine. The problem we are having is syncing or saving any files/changes to these networked accounts. The accounts seem to have home directories created, i went through workgroup manager and set up login/out and background syncs, and nothing seems to work(Copy/save). This year it would have been nice to have the syncing feature since all student/teacher laptops would go back and forth from home and work. However next year will change a bit since we will keep all student laptops here and the teachers will still take them home. We also have desktops of course which do not move and will be accessed by the students.
I need to find a way for students to log into the server to access their account and have it automatically pop up displaying their own files/folder on any machine they access since they wont always be at the same machine. considering there will be upwards of 100 students accessing each machine, local syncing for this would not be a good idea. My best guess would be setting up network home directories so they can log into and work directly from the server and have nothing but the original OS installed on their local machine.
As far as the teachers go, Since they have one laptop the entire year and take them home the syncing method would be the best. That way they can come here, turn on their laptop, automatically sync as they log in, and save everything when they log out (or every so many minutes since some of them close it and just run home). I tried doing this with a student account but could not get it to work. My other problem with this is that the teacher laptops are 10.5 and I have no clue how to bind them to the directory since I was not the one who created the original script which is something i would like to reverse engineer to my standards since it has some nice little things in it I just wish to tweak.
A short recap of what i need:
1) Network based accounts with network home directories, nothing locally saved
2) Network Based accounts with Portable Home Directories, Syncing between local and server files
3) Bind 10.5 machines to server
4) Program to read and edit a script.
I somewhat know the terminology for PHDs and MHDs and have read a bit about those but still cannot get them to work, but I am extremely frustrated with my lack of terminology for NHDs (If that is what they would even be called) and have had a hard time finding any information on how to set them up. The only thing i found was stating that if the server goes down, so do the accounts. Which isnt a problem since we have multiple servers as well as last ditch local accounts for students to just access the computers.
As far as i know, our servers are running LDAPv3 w/ OD, maybe even not with OD, I really don't know. If anyone can give me any help with this it would be much appreciated. If you need any additional information let me know and I will try my best to get it to you. I may even be willing to wipe everything and start fresh if it is required since these havent been used much in over 2 years, only for drive mounting storage.

I received some information on another forum, however I am still stuck.
So i rebound a laptop to the server via Directory Access, created a new account using Workgroup Manager, set the Home Point in WGM for the Account to a specified folder on the server's raid and no luck.
The account authenticates with the server, but it saves everything locally and ignores the NHD. Anyone with any ideas?

[SOLVED] Apache - Home Directories

I am trying to configure home directories but currently am being presented with "Access forbidden!".
I am trying to follow the "piter" advice note on the wiki as I don't want users to be able to read from other users home folders.
[root@host ~]# groupadd pubhtml
[root@host ~]# usermod -aG pubhtml http
[root@host ~]# chmod g+xr-w /home/*
[root@host ~]# chmod g+xr-w /home/*/public_html
I have tried chmoding the users home folder rather than relying on the wildcard (*) too
access_log
xx.xx.xx.xx - - [07/Feb/2013:10:10:58 +0000] "GET /~user HTTP/1.1" 403 1057
error_log
[Thu Feb 07 10:15:14 2013] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.xx] (13)Permission denied: access to /~user denied (filesystem path '/home/user/public_html') because search permissions are missing on a component of the path
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ap … irectories
Last edited by Swarfega (2013-02-07 13:02:21)

Basic permissions:
Each file/directory has:
permissions for an owning user.
permissions for an owning group.
and permissions for other users.
chmod [ugo]= sets the permissions explicitly, rather than adding([ugo]+) or removing([ugo]-) permissions for the current values. Commas separate these alterations, so you can specify multiple changes in a single chmod invocation.
"g=" sets the groups permissions to no read, no write, and no execute (which I believe is the default on user home directories).
I was asking about the group ownership of the directories, because the commands you posted showed that you just created the group and added the http user to it, you didn't chgrp the directories to the new group.
If you want directory listings available, then the http user needs read permissions on the directories too. In that case setting the groups up would be preferable. You probably don't want "others" to be able to list your files too.
Last edited by WorMzy (2013-02-07 11:47:46)

Portable Home Directories over CIFS

I'm trying to configure PHD over CIFS with samba/linux as file server.
It works. But there is a issue. When it synchronizes directory with server, for every newly created folder it complains about problem with sync.But regardless of complain directory is created. I traced down. Error happens when FileSync trying to chflags on directory created on samba share.
Typical error is
0:: 09/12/16 06:49:55.282 EXCEPTION: Invalid argument <-SStoreFileOperator_FS applyPermissionsFromObject: (StoreFileOperator-FS.m:508): chflags('/Network/Servers/cmsdata.tnw.utwente.nl/cifstest/Library/Assistants', flags=0)--> Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=22 UserInfo=0x10058c170 "Invalid argument">
0:: 09/12/16 06:50:02.221 EXCEPTION: Invalid argument <-SStoreFileOperator_FS applyPermissionsFromObject: (StoreFileOperator-FS.m:508): chflags('/Network/Servers/cmsdata.tnw.utwente.nl/cifstest/Library/Autosave Information', flags=0)--> Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=22 UserInfo=0x10057cb50 "Invalid argument">
Also it complains in similar way for chflags for couple of files
<PHD> 0:: 09/12/16 06:48:50.852 EXCEPTION: Operation not permitted <-SStoreFileOperator_FS applyPermissionsFromObject: (StoreFileOperator-FS.m:508): chflags('/Users/cifstest/Library/Preferences/com.apple.CoreGraphics.plist', flags=0x10000)--> Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=1 UserInfo=0x1005839b0 "Operation not permitted">
But files isn't a big issue it is just couple of files from ~/Library which aren't going to be changed often, but complains about every directory - it is definitely too much. And, in fact, it even doesn't really want to set some flags for directories. Most of time it is "flags=0".
Is it possible to switch off this behavior? And not by "unix extensions = no", cause I need support for symlinks.
In fact, if you have mixed mac os x/other unix environment situation with PHD is terrible.
OSX doesn't support kerberized NFS4 in full way, especially through open directory (obviously, autofs doesn't accept vers=4, but even if it would, mount_nfs needs "4.0alpha", while autofs clearly expects number there). Although it is possible to patch sources for both of them, it isn't really solution.
In mixed unix environment AFP to Netatalk is useless, cause it doesn't handle symlinks in proper way (like native OSX server does, translate "slink" fdType into underlying FS symlink.
And with samba it is problem of chflags now. (ACL's also broken with samba BTW).

antst wrote:
Actually, there is a chance that I will add XServe into our setup. But it isn't $500 solution
I was referring to the price of the software only. If you want to add hardware as well, that is a different story.
But, still, Xserve doesn't support nfs4 for linux hosts.
Is that a requirement?
So far, from what I see, best option for file-server in multi-platform environment is solaris.
I think the best option for a server in a multi-platform environment is "each to his or her own". Get MacOS X Server for Macs, Solaris for NFS, and Windows for Windows. They can all access each other, but for system critical tasks like booting and home directories, let them handle what they know best.
It has full support of NFS4 ACLs on ZFS, which means you will also map correctly SAMBA ACLs and Netatalk also supports ACL when underlying system supports NFS4 ACLs (but probably only on solaris).
And in addition you get all nice features of ZFS and probably the best NFS server implementation.
I think you need to review what your requirements really are. You are still going to have 2 out 3 OSes running from foreign servers. You may find yourself back at square one with NFS4 instead of CIFS.
The last time I used Solaris full time was 2006, I think. I was in an organization big enough to have all our Solaris and NFS work done by Sun people on site. NFS went down on a regular basis. We are starting to go back to Solaris at my current big organization because Linux can't handle Multipath and QFS.
Don't get any ideas about me vis-a-vis all those buzzwords. I'm still just a programmer. It is perfectly normal to have multiple servers with different OSes. You can get things working the way they are supposed to work and then see if you can migrate things over to NFS4. I still think you would have more success running MacOS X as the server and getting rid of Netatalk.

10.5.6 Login Items Error with Network Home Directories

I'm splitting this post off from a previous discussion which can be found here:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1835976&tstart=0
With 10.5.6 our Login Items are not working on client machines that use Network Home Directories. Everything works fine under 10.5.5.
When the 10.5.6 client logs in, login items with a path directed to the Home/Documents folder cannot be found, and the following error appears in Console:
"Unable to resolve startup item: status = -35, theURL == NULL = 1"
I have no problem manually navigating to the Home/Documents folder and opening the login items. Removing and re-adding the login items does not fix the problem. Revert to 10.5.5 and the login items are fine.
Below is a suspicious error that I see repeated multiple times in Console (viewing "All Messages") on the 10.5.6 clients but not on the 10.5.5 clients:
Sender:
loginwindow 34
Message:
FolderManager: Failed looking up user domain root; url='file://localhost/Network/Servers/myserver_name.com/Users/my_username/' path =/Network/Servers/myserver_name.com/Users/my_username/ err=-35 uid=0 euid=10790
I'm sure I could find a work-around by moving the location of my login items or maybe even changing to launchd. However, this error seems to indicate something going on with the 10.5.6 install that might be more serious. I've done some typical troubleshooting: DFA, Repairing Permissions, Clearing Caches, trashing loginwindow and MCX preferences, deleting the /Library/Managed Preferences folder, rechecking DNS on the server (forward and reverse lookup OK).
Any help is appreciated!
Thanks!

just to tell you, same thing here - it's nothing special about your setup. it's not a big issue for us as the kernel panic at logout on 10.5.6 is the real killer (no it's NOT JUST FONTS) so our workround is that we're not rolling it out! (staying 10.5.5).
but on my own test 10.5.6 mac i get exactly the same issue with login items that are in the network home. local apps (font management app, ichat etc in /Applications) OK, but stuff on the mounted home server - nope and a line in the syslog for each item:
Jan 28 09:25:54 hc04800-bssaht loginwindow[32028]: Unable to resolve startup item: status = -36, theURL == NULL = 1

NFS Home Directories Yosemite

Has anyone successfully used NFS home directories for network logins?
This used to work in 10.6.8 Server but I am having a hard time setting it up in Yosemite. I need to enable fast user switching with multiple logins to our server which appears to be impossible using AFP.
I'd appreciate any tips on how to accomplish this. All clients and server are running clean Yosemite installs.

Apple stopped officially supporting NFS based home directories when Lion and Server.app was released. I have not done extensive testing but I certainly find two sessions using fast user switching and AFP works with Mavericks clients.
As far as I can see if a Snow Leopard server was connected to a Mavericks or Yosemite OD server it would still be possible for the Snow Leopard server to register an NFS home directory share in to Open Directory. This suggests that it might be possible to do the same even with a Mavericks or Yosemite server but that one would have to do all the work by hand in the command line. The logic for this conclusion is that Mavericks and Yosemite still include NFS even if they do not provide a GUI means to configure it and OD itself would appear to still be able to store records relating to NFS locations.
I have used NFS home directories in the past and found it solved a number of issues including -
Completely getting round Adobe's long time issues with network home directories
The same for some other third-party applications
Allowed 20+ users all on the same server to be logged in to their individual home directories in a Mac Terminal Server setup
This was all back in the days of using Snow Leopard Server.
I get the impression Apple secretly added the ability to use Fast User Switching for network logins with Lion or later to compensate for removing NFS support. This may have been at the behest of the developers of the two Mac Terminal Server products.

Portable Home Directories - Default save location

We are using portable home directories, that is multiple users in Open Directory that have their home set to afp:\\server\Users\ and are configured with mobile accounts and home sync.
The default save location is always the afp:\\server\Users\username location (Desktop or Documents, or whatever is needed depending on the app). The problem is the user saves to the Desktop, but it's not really their local desktop, the file doesn't show up until the next home sync. How can we change the default save location without breaking their home sync?

Hi,
Do you mean you want to change the default location when you click Save and then
Browse? If so, we can do this via group policy.
First, you need to install Office 2010 Administrative Template files (ADM, ADMX/ADML). See:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=18968
Follow this article to add the ADMX files:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc179081(v=office.14).aspx#Load_O14_templates
After that, open your Group Policy Object Editor and navigate to: (Word for example)
User Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\Microsoft Word 2010\Word Options\Advanced\File Locations, double click on
Default File Location, select Enable and defines the default path to save documents under "Options" section.
Restart Word to check the result.
Hope this helps.
Thanks,
Steve Fan
TechNet Community Support

AppleTV sync and Network home directories

I am unable to see the AppleTV device in more than one location, using the same login account.
I have an Xserve that contains user accounts in Open Directory. This Xserve also manages user home directories. This allows me to log on to any machine with the same account and get to my home folder. Do not confuse this with what I believe is called Mobile accounts where the home directory is copied locally to each machine and is kept in sync with the server. Once I log out, nothing remains on the client machine.
So, turned on my AppleTV, logged into my Xserve since it was not being used. This account is also not "local" to the Xserve, i.e. not under /Users/. Launched iTunes, saw the AppleTV, typed in the 5 digit code, and watch the AppleTV sync. OK, no issues. Logged off the Xserve. Logged onto the desktop using the same account I just used on the Xserve. Launched iTunes, no AppleTV listed. Not cool!
Is AppleTV restricted to syncing to one computer, one account, one ip address, or one MAC address? If it is one computer how does it know the different machines?

Thanks folks for the comments but I don't believe I am coming across correctly.
Patience this is a bit compplicated
Infrustructure:
1. Xserve1 running Open Directory, managing multiple client computers and users to include user home directory location via Workgroup Manager.
2. Xserve2 handling 7 Tera Bytes of home directory storage. Repeat 7 Tera Bytes of home directory storage.
3. Many Mac desktops running 10.4.10. Only one local account, we'll call him local-admin on any of these machines which is the local admin account for that machine. Absolutely no other information for users resides on these machines.
When User1 logs onto Desktop1, Desktop1 makes a query for information from Xserve1. Xserve1 response saying the login is correct and that User1's home directory is located on Xserve2. User1 is now logged into Desktop1. Open a Finder window and if you did not know any better you would think User1 was a local user to Desktop1 because you see in Finder on the left column you have the standard items appear such as a "Home" icon next to the username, Desktop, Documents, Movies, Music, etc display. Click on anyone of them and you are in the proper place. User1 loggs off of Desktop1.
User1 now logs onto Desktop2 for whatever reason. Maybe Desktop1 was being used by User34. Desktop2 repeats what Desktop1 did. Makes the call to Xserve1, mounts the home from Xserve2. If you were to go back to Desktop1 you would find no trace of User1 except maybe in log files. The only user listed in MachintoshHD -> Users or in Unix terms /Users would be local-admin. So User1 is the only user and the iTunes library located in User1's home directory is the only library being dealt with.
On to AppleTV:
User1 loggs into Desktop1. Types in code to lock Desktop1 as the syncing source for User1's library. What was not initially understood was AppleTV also is locking Desktop1 as the streaming source for User1's library. You will see in a moment how I found this out. User1 selects the Photos to sync, turns off Movie syncing, selects Music etc. Sync finishes. AppleTV can play content can switch to streaming source and play the videos. User1 logs off Desktop1 and AppleTV acknowledges this by greying out User1's library as a streaming source.
User1 logs into Desktop2. User1 notices AppleTV still shows User1's library is greyed put as a streaming source. Shouldn't that no longer be greyed out since it is the same library? OK, lets add Desktop2 as a New Additional Streaming source. Types in the code that AppleTV displays on User1's library on Desktop2. The Sources screen on AppleTV now changes slightly. The new streaming source is added below a white line. The AppleTV source is still white letters and the original streaming source above the line is still greyed out. The new streaming source is selected and content is viewable. User1 logs off of Desktop2. The new streaming source greys out as expected.
User1 logs back into Desktop1 to sync some more photos to the AppleTV. Desktop1 is used since that is the original syncing computer. iTunes is launched. User1 waits, and waits, and waits. The AppleTV device never appears back in iTunes. Checking the AppleTV, all content is gone. User1 logs back onto Desktop2 to see if streaming still works. Nope, streaming no longer works.
Spent almost 2 hours on the phone with Apple support. Nice bunch of folks. Spoke with multiple tiers of AppleTV support and even had a gentleman on from the Enterprise Division on the phone. They are elevating this up higher and promise to get back with me. Hoping.
Complicated, yes.
My thoughts on how to solve this, don't lock the device to a computer, lock the device to an account for syncing. Also, don't automatically lock a streaming source when locking a syncing source.

Multiple Home Directories

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