Samba, Printers, Win2000

Post #23,953 by cwbrenn 1/11/02 3:40:27 PM Reply	Samba, Printers, Win2000 It seems like every six months or so I have yet another stupid Samba question. I've searched through dejanews to try and figure out this one, and the problem is that a lot of people seem to be having it, and all the answers people have suggested are DIFFERENT. sigh Week before last I upgraded Samba on my server (Darklord), which is a Mandrake Linux 8.1 box. Suddenly, my Windows 2000 box (Alex) stopped printing to it -- in fact, it claimed it couldn't even SEE the printer. It could access all my file shares, and interestingly enough my eComStation box (Mark) could print to Darklord just fine. I fiddled with this and that -- next thing you know, Alex couldn't access Darklord's file shares, Mark couldn't print or access shares. I fiddled with that and the other thing -- all of a sudden I had hosed my server, couldn't FTP (I don't know why, I don't think it was a samba thing I think I accidentally hosed something else during the process). I miraculously managed to fix almost everything by backtracking and then resetting samba to a "vanilla" state of operation. After fiddling a bit more, Alex and Mark can access their file shares on Darklord, and they can SEE the printer shares, and connect to them, but they can't use them. One of the deja articles I read suggested a problem could be that Alex and Mark don't have write access to Darklord's printer shares. As near as I can tell, I've set it up so they do. How can I be sure? And could there be any other reason for my pain? "We are all born originals -- why is it so many of us die copies?" - Edward Young
Post #23,999 by static 1/12/02 1:53:28 AM Reply	I'm blue-skying here... ... but it sounds like the Samba security level and user database might be the root of the problem. Unix user to Samba user translation is a bit magical and newer versions of Samba do this better than older ones. But there are ways of doing Samba users without referencing the Unix users at all as a legacy from when the former was too hard. No, I don't understand all the ins and outs. I, too, have tinkered with settings in Samba because stuff didn't work and managed to make things go without understanding what I was fixing! (Andrew Tridgell has admitted Samba suffers from "optionitis", but I guess when you're dealing with such a complex and history-ridden protocol, there is really no option.) Wade. "All around me are nothing but fakes Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"
Post #24,029 by cwbrenn 1/12/02 11:22:15 AM Reply	ok... I [b]do[/b] have it set up so that the Unix IDs synch with the Samba IDs... I need that, in order for the machines to find their proper shares... don't I? Um. Hrmmm... all of the users (basically, me and my wife) have (non-admin) accounts on Darklord, and THEORETICALLY when we log in through samba it's supposed to synch with those accounts. Is there another way of doing it? Samba is an incredibly useful feature that I find I dislike mightily. :) "We are all born originals -- why is it so many of us die copies?" - Edward Young
Post #24,127 by static 1/13/02 5:13:48 AM Reply	Hmm. Try to grok the password settings, if you can. Samba can be setup so that it uses the Unix userids but still refers to its own password database. RedHat 6.2 did it that way, IIRC. Oh, and have you checked all the directory permissions? I often find I forget to give search (i.e. executable on directories) at some point when access suddenly vanishes. Wade. "All around me are nothing but fakes Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"

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