Network Accounts and mapping a unique IP per machine

Ok guys, I have an interesting question and hopefully someone can help me out.
I have a 10.7 Server that I would like to use to manage network accounts for a few of my users. We have 3 MacPro desktops that are our production machines. Each of these machines has a unique IP that they use to connect via fiber to a NAS unit. Each of these machines are currently set up and running, and all the users share the same username and password.
We would like them to be able to sign in on each machine but we also need the machine specific AFP mounts to work, and work across all 3 machines. We also need to do this in a way that doesn't involve us wiping each machine becuase the process to reload some of this software is a nightmare.
Any thoughts or ideas?

Ok, well since I'm not getting much feedback here I'll bring you all up to date. I have the Profile Manager setup and added the server IPs to the Machine Profile. I log in and it isn't always consistant. Some times the AFP share mounts, sometimes it does not. Any ideas?

Similar Messages

Mobility and Network account Sync

I'm using Network Account and I sync my MacBooks with Mobility in Workgroup Manager.
In Terminal I see that files dotted (.ssh, .profile, .....) are not synced at all.
I try to modify "Home sync" in Mobility in Network Manager, but nothing happened.
Any suggestion?
Thanks!

SOLVED!!!
I hope this is usefull for others!
I do this:
1) Login in your user
2) Enable sync Rules in Workgroup manager -> Mobility (I use Workgroup manager installed in my client)
Manage: Once - Sync: login, logout, background, manual
In options choose Manage: Once - Sync in background: Every 20 minutes - Show status in menu bar
3) Create a temp fake file in home client to force update the modification date (I use terminal):
touch ~/.fakefile.txt
4) Logout and login in your user from client and wait that the sync finish its job
5) Go to user System Preferences -> Users and Group -> Mobile account and setup your preferences about sync as you want (you have to chek the logout for full sync)
6) Delete the fake file (I use terminal):
rm ~/.fakefile.txt
Now you can try to create a hidden dotted directory/file and try manual sync to see if it is syncing.
mkdir ~/.fakedir
and after you see the sync (remember, this is just for test) you can delete it
rmdir ~/.fakedir
Now, in my clients it was all right.
Ciao!

How do I block a network account in 10.6.8?

TL;DR - I have a local account with the same credentials as a network account. The network account logs in, but doesn't work the way I want. How can I get the login window to not ask me to pick between the two and default to the local account? Not allowing network logins under "Accounts" doesn't work.
I have about 15 iMacs running 10.6.8 that I am having an issue with. I am in a middle school and we're going to begin testing students soon. Our plan is to have a unique user account that students login to that will automatically launch the test in order to minimize potential problems. All of these computers are part of our Windows domain to manage printing, and the account we're using is a network account. I've set up 120 other computers without an issue - they login with the network account, hold all the settings and perform exactly as expected. The exception being three machines that for whatever reason refuse to login to the network account, though everything is identical to working machines. As a workaround, I created a local user with the exact same username and password. The idea is that staff won't have two sets of credentials when they want to start the test.
These 15 computers do not hold any settings for the network account. I've modified the dock, changed settings, and every time I log out it's all lost. I log back in, expecting to see my changes, and it's as if it's creating a new default account each time. So as a workaround, I created the local user with the same username and password as in the cases above. Now when I attempt to login, the login window shows me two options - the network account, and the local account. I've disabled logging in with a network account and it doesn't make a difference. I'm assuming that this is happening because the network account did/does successfully login, even if it's not holding settings, while the machines that never did login don't have this problem, thus no screen asking me to pick between logins.
This is going to confuse my users and cause problems that I may not be available to address within an approriate timeframe. Once a network account has successfully logged in, is there any way prevent it from trying to login again, defaulting to the local account instead? I know OS X is supposed to check against local users first, but I've never seen it ask me to pick between local and network like this before. Thanks in advance for your help!

Hi Rob,
Safe Boot , (holding Shift key down at bootup), use Disk Utility from there to Repair Permissions, test if things work OK in Safe Mode.
Then move these files to the Desktop...
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.sidebarlists.plist
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.desktop.plist
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.recentitems.plist
Reboot & test.
PS. Safe boot may stay on the gray radian for a long time, let it go, it's trying to repair the Hard Drive.

Is there a way to merge/migrate my local home folder to a network account

My family has a number of Macbooks and a couple of iMacs and we've been thinking we'd like centralized storage for our media collection and other files and I'd like an easier way to deal with these machines to keep them updated, etc. Also we swap laptops and desktops depending on who needs to do what at a particular moment. Is there a way to migrate an existing home folder on a macbook to an account on the server. What I would like to be able to do is to be able to log into any computer in my home and have it look like "my" computer, with files, settings etc... Since I am new to the server world I am confused by the terminology re: network accounts and mobile accounts. Is there a good guide someone could recommend to get me started. Thanks.

Hi Yodalogger,
I hope you have yourself sorted. I've been through alot of pain with lion server, it's very buggy at best.
Your best bet is SolidWood's suggestion of network accounts if you are constantly on the same network. I use this at home and it works very well. For simplicity, you can use WorkGroup Manager for this as it's more intuitive!
If, you need a mobile account, this is what I did.
I migrated local macbook accounts to server machine (migration assistant).
I renamed the /User home folders on macbook to _backup. For safety.
I deleted local accounts from macbook. Keep your _backup home folders! Also, you will need to have a local Admin account in place. Make sure you do not delete it.
On Server. You will have local accounts created for all your migrated macbook accounts. Just remove the accounts in system preferences but ensure you leave the /User home folders in place when prompted.
On server. I created the new users (old mackbook accounts) and groups in the server app. This doesn't create or overwrite your existing home folders. So go ahead and name them exactly the same as before and make sure the accounts match your home folder's names.
On server, using profile manager, I set up mobility etc., for the device. That is, you need to enroll your macbook with the server and configure services for it in profile manager. You can add a placeholder for this in profile manager to configure stuff.
A handy tip to alleviate all the automatic push settings pain and heartache is to set the general payload to manual. You can then wip up the profile manager from your macbook to install the profiles manually. (easily done).
On Macbook, login with local admin account.
On Macbook, go to system prefs and accounts, set up your open directory stuff in the login options.
On Macbook, log out of admin. Back at the login screen, you should see your admin account and 'Other.' Give it a few minutes or so to figure this out. It needs to contact the server etc. for info.
Once you have 'Other' click on it and login with one of your new network accounts. This will log you in as a network account - you should see all your usual settings that previously existed on your macbook when it was a local account.
At this point, you whip up profile manager. http://yourserver.local/profilemanager Change yourserver to the name of your server.
Login to profile manager with your admin account. I do this as I will be downloading a few profiles that only admin has access to.
So, you need to download a trust profile, your device profile, and a profile for remote management if you have set this up. You may have seen various download buttons knocking around the the interface. In downloads double click these to install (if it doesn't do this automatically).
Log out of everything.
Log back in with one of your network accounts. This time you should be prompted to create a mobile account. Say yes and let it sync your home folders from server to macbook.
Once each mobile account is created, you can then further define user/group settings in profile manager. You download these by logging into http://yourserver.local/mydevices as the user and download the appropriate settings.
I think thats it. Sorry, if its not detailed enough - I'm presuming you know yourself around a mac! I have to say the process is straightforward but Lion Server is not. I do not get consistent results with it and I'm still trying to tame it...
By far the easiest option is network accounts. Mobile accounts need more attention.
I hope this helps (and anybody else!)
Paul.

SL bound clients can't logon Lion Server network accounts

Sorry if this has been covered or resolved elsewhere elsewhere, if so please point me in the right direction!
I posted this in a different thread and it was suggested this one would be more helpful.
I've spent all day with a new mac pro with Lion Server installed trying to set up a small network. Created an OD Master (from the Server App) then used WGM to make accounts. From the Server app I'd created sharepoints (where has File Sharing gone in Server Admin?) one of which was enabled to be used as home directories for which I configured back in WGM. I then bound SL clients computers to OD making sure there were no hypens in the computer names and allowed all network users to logon onto the machine as well as adding the Lion servers IP address as a DNS record.
The problem is, I go to logon with the network account and it starts to logon, i.e the icon expands rather than shakes then stops with the not very informative error "Cannot log you on because an error occurred".
The bound clients appear in WGM. The user accounts look ok. I've not enabled SSL on anything. This is really frustrating.
Any help much appreciated.
Regards,
Evan

Sorry if this has been covered or resolved elsewhere elsewhere, if so please point me in the right direction!
I posted this in a different thread and it was suggested this one would be more helpful.
I've spent all day with a new mac pro with Lion Server installed trying to set up a small network. Created an OD Master (from the Server App) then used WGM to make accounts. From the Server app I'd created sharepoints (where has File Sharing gone in Server Admin?) one of which was enabled to be used as home directories for which I configured back in WGM. I then bound SL clients computers to OD making sure there were no hypens in the computer names and allowed all network users to logon onto the machine as well as adding the Lion servers IP address as a DNS record.
The problem is, I go to logon with the network account and it starts to logon, i.e the icon expands rather than shakes then stops with the not very informative error "Cannot log you on because an error occurred".
The bound clients appear in WGM. The user accounts look ok. I've not enabled SSL on anything. This is really frustrating.
Any help much appreciated.
Regards,
Evan

Lion Server Network Account loses all created files after logout

Hi,
I am new to Server, I got Lion Server working on a Mac Mini and everything was alright until I added users from existing client machines. I created new Users on the Server App with the same name and passwords as on the existing client machines, logged in as root on the Server and copied the client user home folder contents from an external HD into the User home directory on the Server. After that I ran Batchmod on all the User folders on the server and everything seemed to be working alright, now the only problem is, if you create a file or folder on the desktop it is not there anymore the next time I log back in. The accounts are setup as Network Accounts, and they are available from any computer in the office, they just don't save any settings that have been changed or any files and folders.
I have found the "Convert a local Home into a Network Home" post to late, http://www.afp548.com/article.php?story=20050331212133607&query=migrate%2B
does this sound like a permissions issue, and if so, can I still repair it or is it better to start fresh?
Thank you

I think your problem has a rather simple solution, since all files in a directory aren't modified unless you tell the OS or a program you've installed to.
To keep the external hard drive mounted even when nobody is logged into your server, enter the following into terminal:
sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/autodiskmount \
AutomountDisksWithoutUserLogin -bool YES
I think your server is looking for the external Hard Drive, but can' tfind it and thus defaults back to the internal HD.

Login with a network account in offline, possible?

Hello,
I have a question, since I had before snow leopard server. So the questions now belongs to the Lion Server, the dedicated server. And this is not a issue, but few questions to you and need to plan to setup to the dedicated server if there is a or few way to do!
Before I could login in with a network account from Snow Leopard server from my MacBook PRO. I think there is still possible to do it. But now today I just wonder is there a possible to login in with a network account in offline too, also no internet require? And what is the name for that? True, I don't know a lot of VPN and never used this, can you explain bit about it? But I know when I logged in, I used a Open Directory account and this was "virtual screen", no need to open the screen sharing program or whatever. It just was from the Login Window, also when you are turn on the computer. Do you know what name and know how to could use a network account in offline on my mac?
I just want to give you an example:
If I am sitting in a flight to Vancouver from London, then there I have no internet access in flight trip, so I just login the network account and this had before "cache". Of course need to login in internet first to get all informations and files in computer, so these are stored in my computer. Then I am working with a presentation during the trip. When I am arrived in Vancouver, then I am connecting to a internet, so the computer, also the network account will update to the server with these new files etc or of these what I did in during the flight trip.
Here is few question sticks from the text above:
1. Can I use a network account in offline?
2. Do you know any name for this method in Mac?
3. I don't know VPN, so what do this mean and containing what?

Hi
"1. Can I use a network account in offline?"
If I've understood you correctly, yes.
"2. Do you know any name for this method in Mac?"
There are several: Portable Home Directories, Mobility, Mobile Accounts etc:
http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/UserMgmt_v10.6.pdf
Page 215 onwards. Additionally Page 163 if Active Directory is involved.
"3. I don't know VPN, so what do this mean and containing what?"
You could have googled this yourself but here you go:
http://www.howstuffworks.com/vpn.htm
Essentially it's a means of providing a secure connection from remote networks such as your home or possibly a hotel to a specific location - such as your office or place of work - which allows you to access Servers and/or Services as if you were at that location itself.
". . . so the computer, also the network account will update to the server with these new files etc or of these what I did in during the flight trip."
Depending on where you are and the size of the files this may be a doutftul/painful experience and possibly not worth undertaking? However only you would really know? IMO it would make more sense to sync these files once you were back on the Server's network. It's possible you may benefit by signing up for MobileMe or iCloud?
HTH?
Tony

Setting up a plain network-account server

To simplify a process I need to get done quickly, but have no knowledge of, I am asking for the support of the helpful users here in the discussions.
The end product I need is a 10.5 server (already installed and not set up yet) to host network user accounts to a number of 10.5 client computers (set up with one local admin account each).
Each user account just needs to be a standard account and I need the clients to show a list of available network accounts, with each account having a fully functional home folder on the server.
The server itself needs to do nothing else but this function. The server and the clients already exist on a fully set up network with each client machine having only to set up a specific IP address, router IP, and DNS server in it's network preferences to join the network. The server can join the network the same way.
What I need to know is what is the best way to set up the server to only provide the network accounts and no other service? Consider the server can be wiped and set up again if anything goes wrong, any links to online literature or a step by step guide posted here would be greatly appreciated.

To simplify a process I need to get done quickly, but have no knowledge of, I am asking for the support of the helpful users here in the discussions.
The end product I need is a 10.5 server (already installed and not set up yet) to host network user accounts to a number of 10.5 client computers (set up with one local admin account each).
Each user account just needs to be a standard account and I need the clients to show a list of available network accounts, with each account having a fully functional home folder on the server.
The server itself needs to do nothing else but this function. The server and the clients already exist on a fully set up network with each client machine having only to set up a specific IP address, router IP, and DNS server in it's network preferences to join the network. The server can join the network the same way.
What I need to know is what is the best way to set up the server to only provide the network accounts and no other service? Consider the server can be wiped and set up again if anything goes wrong, any links to online literature or a step by step guide posted here would be greatly appreciated.

Mobile accounts reset to normal network accounts ?

Hello
I've switched my network users back from mobile accounts to normal network accounts after experimenting for awhile. I have deselected the mobile account preferences for all my machines in WGM and deleted all the local home folders created by synching my network accounts on the local machines in Volume/Users. There's obviously more things I need to do, as:
Some desktop machines allow users to login normally with their network account and mount the network home at login (shortcut in dock via MCX) as before mobile synching. This seems to be only for machines the user did not use when there were mobile account prefs. set .
Other machines create a new local home for the user but also leave a question mark in the dock for their "User's Network Home Folder"; which mounts with full access when clicking the question mark.
Lastly, some machines are not mounting the network home at all, but authorizing the user with their LDAP account and making a new local home instead.
Is this a cache, preferences or corrupt config. issue or something else?
thanks
Xserve G5, G4s, eMacs, iMac G5s, 10.4.5 all

Deleting the mobile user account records in System Preferences>Accounts solved it.
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20031222232124568

CS3 Serial Number doesn't hold (network accounts)

I work for a school and we recently purchased Photoshop CS3 (w/ a 30-user site license) for our students to use in the computer graphics (CG) lab (all intel macbooks). We created an image with PS on it (along with the serial number, done as an admin) and applied the image to all CG computers. We also use a file-management system called Filewave to push out updates en masse instead of applying updates to individual machines.
When the students first started using the program it worked fine, no problems. They logged into their network accounts and PS ran great. However, and I'm not sure about this, but when the 10.0.1 update came through, it knocked out the serial number. Now, every time a student wants to use PS, he/she has to enter the serial number (the teacher has it in big letters up on the chalkboard, permanently).
Since that happened, I've seen it happen on two other machines (another macbook and a brand new iMac) but they are both on network (mobile) accounts. I've got CS3 on my machine and my principal has it on his (macbook pros, neither are networked) and we haven't had any problems.
I've been working on one of the CG macbooks through an admin account to try to figure out what the problem is. I did a clean uninstall (I think...the Adobe Uninstaller tool has never worked -- I get a JavaScript Alert - installer database invalid -- so I used the mac CS3Clean tool provided by adobe and deleted anything related to adobe - a mistake??). When I reinstalled the software, it installed without any errors and it took the site serial number. I restarted the machine and shut it down, and was able to get into PS without a problem. As soon as I apply the 10.0.1 update and restart, I get the prompt for a serial number again. I did another clean uninstall and reinstall, and now even without the update I get prompted for the serial number every time ( I haven't even logged into a network account yet).
So now I come to you! Has anyone ever come across this problem? Is there a bug in the 10.0.1 update that won't let the serial number "stick?" Any ideas on this one? Is there a problem using this on network accounts? Any help is welcome!
Thank you.

Got it! After spending around 3-4 hours on the phone with Adobe, we found out that the file that holds the serial number info (cache.db) was being replaced by our FileWave software. So when you enter the serial number into the adobe SN prompt, it modifies the cache.db file and allows a user to keep using PS. After a restart however, our file-maintenance software sees that there is a change to that file and promptly replaces it with an older version, thus eliminating the PS serial number.
At first this seemed kind of strange since we did not set FileWave to touch any PS files. Then we found out that Adobe Reader uses the exact same file to store its information in (which FileWave was set to maintain). So, we turned off all maintenance on Adobe products and now we are having no serial number issues. The chalk can now be erased from the proverbial blackboard. In retrospect, it looks like the 10.0.1 update had nothing to do with anything, it just turned out to be coincidental timing.
Thanks for all of your help!

Mac Mail & Open Dir Network Accounts

As a system administrator for my family business I have a question.
I am running a Mac Mini server with all services enabled from lion server..
I currently use a Airport Extreme for routing and port fowarding
The client end computers consist of a G4 tower running leopard and a iMac 2009 running snow leopard...
Sometimes when a user connects to his or her network account and tries to send email using mac mail, the messages will either take an extremely long time to send or not send at all. Also sometimes the network accounts begin to act very strange and a reboot is required on the whole server/client side to restore proper function.
Ideas to what is causing this problem?
Joe

Wow, thanks a lot, I think I got it working now.
Is there a website / wiki / knowledge base where I can find all the differences between Snow Leopard Server and Lion Server?

Can not login to a network account.

I dont typically support macs, but I have a client with an odd issue that I can not solve.
He has a Macbook Pro with OSX 10.6.
He logs in using his network account, authenticating against an OSX 10.5 server.
When he tries to to login, it appears as if he has a bad password.
His account is able to login just fine on other Macbooks in the company. (So I'm assuming his network account and password are fine)
Other users are able to log into HIS Macbook just fine, inclusing new accounts that have never before logged into this Macbook. (So I assume his macbook is communicating just fine with the OSX server)
When I go into the accounts list in the Macbook, his account is not there. It's missing.
If I try to create an account with his name, I'm told the account already exists.
We ran diskutility to repair the permissions on the drive, but this did not fix the issue.
Any ideas?
On the windows support side I would simply rebuild the users profile.. I'm not sure what the equivilent is on the mac side.

I'm having a similar problem. Could you let me know how to eliminate the mobile account using the command line?
Thanks!

Turn off the option for users whether to sync mobile or network accounts?

Hi i have 40 users using mobile accounts, with no hassle for the last year as they were tied to the same machines. but this year they have to have the need to use which ever machine is available. The problem then is it keeps asking them whether to sync to mobile account or network account. They should only have a mobile account so i'm not really sure why its asking me? is there a way of turning off their network accounts or just forcing it to only sync mobile account? so confused... (just to clarify i don't want any of their accounts running off the server itself, i just want it to sync back to the server on login and log off which ever machine they are on. I'm just a little worried as i seem to remember someone choosing sync network account and it got rid of all their documents and files.

The problem was an error in naming the computer group. Renaming it solved the problem.

10.5.8 Client suddenly stops authenticating network accounts

Hello,
We have an Xserve running OS X Server 10.6.8, and connected to it via OD are a mix of 10.5 (PPC) and 10.6 (Intel) clients. Everything was working fine until one day the network accounts on one of the 10.5 clients stopped authenticating (anyone trying to login to their accounts on that computer got the shaking login box). On further testing, it was revealed that you could still log in, but with outdated passwords, leading me to believe that there was some communication error between the server and the client about updating Manged Client preferences, or about updating passwords if they had been changed elsewhere.
Attached are console logs linked to any attempt to login with a network account and the current password associated with it (HAIL is the name of the computer):
05/09/2012 14:25:56 com.apple.loginwindow[189] MCXCCacheMCXRecordAndGraph(): [localNode createRecordWithRecordType:dsRecTypeStandard:Computers name:"HAIL"] == -14131 (Unable to set value(s) for dsAttrTypeStandard:HardwareUUID in record HAIL.)
05/09/2012 14:25:56 com.apple.loginwindow[189] MCXD.getComputerInfoFromStartup: MCXCCacheGraph() == -14131 (Unable to set value(s) for dsAttrTypeStandard:HardwareUUID in record HAIL.)
05/09/2012 14:25:56 com.apple.loginwindow[189] MCXD.getComputerInfoFromStartup: MCXCCacheGraph() == -14131 (Unable to set value(s) for dsAttrTypeStandard:HardwareUUID in record HAIL.)
05/09/2012 14:25:56 com.apple.loginwindow[189] MCXD.getComputerInfoFromStartup: MCXCCacheGraph() == -14131 (Unable to set value(s) for dsAttrTypeStandard:HardwareUUID in record HAIL.)
Steps I have taken to rectify this that have failed:
- Unbinding and rebinding the client to the server.
- A forced Managed Client preferences refresh.
- Resetting all computer preferences in Workgroup Manager to default for this computer.
- Using disk utility to check and fix permissions on the local drive.
None of it has worked, and any help would be appreciated.
Thank you,
Raghuvir Kasturi

Something that I've been looking at along with this problem is that my master directory no longer has a DNS name when looking at it's configuration in Server Admin.
I can see the server, people can also log in up to 10.5.2, and I can see it with an nslookup, but I'm not sure why I cannot see a DNS name in the admin.
Quick information about our setup: We have an OD Master and two OD Replicas. The master is where our faculty and students logs in to and faculty stores their data, the replicas are where the students store their data.
One of our techs here is trying to remember how to do it, but apparently our old apple tech had set up one of the replica servers to act as a DNS server which would then give the master server it's DNS name...I guess the DNS server had one entry which was the master, and then the master pointed itself to that DNS server to get it's information.
Does anyone have any information on this or how I can get it to work?
To see what it looks like in Server Admin, please check http://i41.tinypic.com/15nvqlt.jpg

Active Directory - Network Accounts Unavailable after reboot

The issue I'm having with Snow Leopard is that I can bind accounts to AD and on the first boot it works perfectly. It shows Network Accounts Available and I can login using an AD account. After I reboot and on every boot after the first it then shows Network Accounts Unavailable. I logged in as local admin and it shows it is bound to the domain and it has a green light under the Directory Utility for the domain.
Here are the main bits of info regarding this problem:
1. Computer is bound to domain on first boot using Deploy Studio's firstboot script. This works brilliantly on 10.5 and only became a problem on 10.6.
2. On first boot, it binds to the domain correctly and shows Network Accounts Available. I can log in using a network account and everything is peachy.
3. If I reboot the machine, the status on the loginbox changes to Network Accounts Unavailable and has a red light.
4. If I've logged in to an AD account on first boot, it will log in even with the red light present (it is a mobile account). This is working properly.
5. If I try to log in using an account that has never logged in before, it will not log it in.
6. If I login in as local admin and check the Directory Utility, it shows the machine as being properly bound to the domain and has a green light even thought the login box shows a red one.
These are all the facts surrounding this issue that I have at the moment. I am booting up a 10.5 image right now that is freshly imaged and will report back its behavior using the same AD binding script that is being used on the 10.6 image.

Quick Update on the 10.5 AD Binding test I said I was doing.
Every time I reboot on 10.5, it says Network Accounts Unavailable for a few seconds and then switches to Network Accounts Available.
On Snow Leopard, it never switches to Network Accounts Available, it stays stuck on unavailable.
Thanks in advance,
Nate

Network Accounts and mapping a unique IP per machine

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