Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!ll-xn!cit-vax!tybalt.caltech.edu!wetter From: wetter@tybalt.caltech.edu (Pierce T. Wetter) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: Networking software Message-ID: <3104@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> Date: Sun, 28-Jun-87 00:42:14 EDT Article-I.D.: cit-vax.3104 Posted: Sun Jun 28 00:42:14 1987 Date-Received: Sun, 28-Jun-87 05:26:01 EDT References: <382@aucs.UUCP> Sender: news@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu Reply-To: wetter@tybalt.caltech.edu.UUCP (Pierce T. Wetter) Distribution: na Organization: Calfornia Institute of Technology Lines: 56 In article <382@aucs.UUCP> paul@aucs.UUCP (Paul Steele) writes: > >What about Appleshare and MacServe? ANY comment from net-land would be >most welcome. Thanks. > > AppleShare seems is a really well designed fileserver but it is much more business oriented then university oriented. Namely, in my experience as the Mac Consultant here at Caltech I've noticed several things t which annoyed the hell out of me: 1. Users cannot be added when the server is up and running. In a business environment this isn't a problem since the network manager can stay a few minutes later, but in a university it's very annoying to have to come in at 4 in the morning to add accounts or do some simple maintenance. 2. There are no such things as system privledges etc. That is it's difficult to keep some people from doing one set of things while letting another set do a similar thing. To some extent this is possible by creating groups which are the only ones allowed to do certain things. For instance, AppleShare defines the owner (initially) of most folders to be "Custodian" who effectivly fufills the same functions as root on a unix machine. In the caltech maclab the custodian and those people who are members of the "FileServer" group are allowed R/W/dir privledges while all others are restricted to R/Dir. Thus effectivly there is a "FileServer" privledge. However, in the Users directories they are allowed to set the group as they see fit and can thus deny access to their files even from the Custodian. This means that when the disks fill up and it is time to clean out the user directories the Custodian must shut down the server, change the groups on all of the users folders, then bring the server back up and delete the files. YUK! 3. You can do anything you wish while you are on the server mac but very little when you are logged-in as custodian. Again, necessitating a server shutdown. On the other hand there are a lot of pros to AppleShare. 1. Fits smoothly into the mac environment, and is well supported by othe companies, noteably microsoft. 2. Well designed, very mac-like administration program. Adding, deleteing users and groups is a snap. 3. It Works damn well, despite the administration problems. Note: all of the above comments apply to version 1.0 PIerce Wetter wetter@tybalt.caltech.edu "But this has taken us far afield from interface, which is not a bad place to be, since I particularly want to move ahead to the kludge. Why do people have so much trouble understanding the kludge? What is a kludge, after all, but not enough Ks, not enough ROMs, not enough RAMs, poor quality interface and too few bytes to go around? Have I explained yet about the bytes?" -------------------------------------------- wetter@tybalt.caltech.edu --------------------------------------------