--- Forwarded Message from David Herren <[log in to unmask]> ---

>Date: Wed, 2 May 2001 15:03:19 -0400
>From: David Herren <[log in to unmask]>
>To: Language Learning and Technology International Information Forum    <[log in to unmask]>
>In-Reply-To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: #6101 Apple OSX

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By "connect to NT4 servers" I assume that you mean make an appletalk/share 
connection to an NT4 box as a file server? If so, you are correct, OSX 
will not connect to NT4. This is not an OSX issue, it's an NT4 issue. NT4 
appletalk support has always been limited to Appletalk Phase I, which hasn'
t been an active protocol for 5 years or more. (Ironically, all the 
complaints from sysadmins about Appletalk being a very "chatty" protocol 
were all in reference to Phase I, but Apple hasn't made a server product 
that used phase I for years. Thus, the ONLY phase I server products out 
there were NT4 and some very old unix appletalk clones. Thus the problem 
wasn't apple's protocol, but rather Microsoft's poor implementation of the 
protocol...)

As Otmar points out in an earlier message, Win2K appletalk support 
includes Appletalk Phase II (which was implemented with system 6 on the 
mac side, I believe...) Incidentally, OSX as an appleshare file server 
doesn't even use Appletalk Phase II for transport--it uses TCP/IP. Phase 
II support is only used for resource discovery in the chooser in older 
clients (older, as in any version of the MacOS prior to X). The actual 
transport is done over IP (as long as the older client supports appleshare 
over IP). Future versions of MacOSX server are purported to not even use 
Phase II for resource discovery, favoring other technologies instead, 
marking the end of appletalk support altogether in favor of TCP/IP.

With respect to the routers, the problem is again not with OSX, but rather 
with the router being capable of only Phase I (or misconfigured to route 
only phase I).

Complaining about no phase I support is a little like complaining about 
the lack of MUMPS support...

By the way, an OSX box running samba will outperform NT4 file serving even 
to windows clients in almost every case. I run an OSXServer box that is a 
file server for ONLY windows clients and the clients (machines and humans)
  don't didn't notice the change except that the performance suddenly 
improved... In this particular case, ALL data lives on the server. User 
directories & profiles, applications, all shared resources, etc. The only 
thing local on the windows boxes is the Win2K operating system.

On Tuesday, May 1, 2001, at 05:02 PM, LLTI-Editor wrote:

> So, has anyone else noticed that OSX does not talk to NT4 servers? Or
> that it doesn't allow connection through Apple Talk to printers given
> certain types of routers?
>
> Our OIT went so far as to pull OSX from the campus store and refuse
> to support it until such time as those problems are solved.

/david

--
david herren    |       In an Internet without walls,
shoreham, vt    |       who needs Windows or Gates?