Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with osx and network

A network between two adjacent buildings

eustacescrubb — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 08:44:19 -0800

I need advice on the best and least expensive way to have a network between two adjacent buildings. I'm part of a writer's residency, and the organization owns two houses next door to each other. We want to have one network, with one internet connection, between the two houses. One house has the only desktop there will be, and at least one WiFi-capable laptop. The other house has nothing but WiFi-capable laptops. There is a mixture of people running Windows XP and Mac OSX (nothing older than Leopard).

Ideally, I would like to have a blazing fast internet connection, and one router, to which the desktop is connected, and then maybe have some kind of powerful antenna to boost the WiFi signal over to the other house. It would be awesome if I could also get printer sharing, Bonjour (or whatever they're calling it this week) for Windows and Mac set up, file sharing, etc -- basically the ideal would be to have an honest-to-god network set up. I can do all that once I know how to share the network between the two buildings. Our org doesn't have a lot of extra money so I would like to keep the cost as low as possible.

Latency? This. Is. Infiniteloop!

selfnoise — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 12:28:23 -0800

Help me try and fix my mother's weird internet/Mac Mini issue. So, my mother has a Mac Mini. This is one of the older PowerPC ones... no wireless. It's connected via a cat5 cable to a ZyXel wireless router, which is then connected to a DSL modem. The problem she has is a delay between requesting a webpage and having it start to load (in any web browser). Since I am a Windows user, I don't know much about Macs, so I am at a loss.

Pertinent factoids:

-When I go to dslreports.com and run a speed test, I get a latency of between 500-900ms, which seems really high.

-When I ping google.com from within OS X's network dialog, however, the latency looks normal.

-My netbook and another Windows PC can connect wirelessly without this issue. I also connected my netbook to the router using the same cat5 cable; no issue.

-I tried setting the DNS servers to opendns instead of the default; no change.

Apparently the system did not originally have this issue. Any ideas?

A crash course in server administration

meowN — Sun, 31 May 2009 02:52:02 -0800

At work I'm jumping head first into trying to setup and manage a OS X Server to be used for network load balancing, routing, and possibly netbooting a group of machines. Any tips or help appreciated. I'm currently working retail at a computer sales store that also has an internet cafe of about 30 computers. I've asked for, and been given permission to play around with and attempt to configure, an OS X Server 10.5.7 running on a dual-processor G5 (with 5 ethernet ports, 2 for WAN and the other 3 for each subnet). I've never really used the mac os before, but have a few years of playing around with various linux distros as my desktop os.

For most of these questions I'm not needing direct answers even, I've really just been at a loss trying to find good online resources to read and put it all together. I really want to learn and get a grasp on what's going on, so even just links to reading to get me started would be excellent.

Issue 1: network load balancing. In the store we have two separate DSL lines coming in to serve the whole building. From what I've read so far, it seems that OSX doesn't have this functionallity built-in, and I'm at a loss as to where to start looking for a solution.

Issue 2: Routing. This one I feel like I've gotten really close and am just missing one last step. The goal here is to have DHCP and NAT running for 3 subnets; the tech/service area, the internet cafe, and our internal network. I have the DHCP/NAT/Firewall services all running, and dhcp is working properly giving each subnet an appropriate IP address, I'm able to ping the local server from a client machine, but it's not actually sharing the internet connection to any of the subnets. (Haven't had the chance to hook up a switch to any of the subnets yet either, so don't know if client machines would be able to see each other on the network as well.)

Hypothetical 1: netbooting for the 30+ computers in the internet cafe. As it is currently, the cafe has about 3 or 4 different models of computers all running windows xp. The problem is, they're all regular installations, so if during the course of a days use one gets a virus, we have to manually take a disk to the machine to re-image it. I'd like to set it up to where each machine could just load a fresh image off the network each morning and run like new. This I'm not familiar with at all, and don't even know if OSX can even netboot a WinXP machine.

Besides this there will probably be some basic file sharing and web hosting, but those seem pretty well documented and I'm not worried about getting that running.

So any tips, links, answers, or leads would be excellent. I'm hoping to get this machine configured and possibly even implemented into the network by the end of next week.

Recommend Mac OS X scanner software

Joe in Australia — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 04:04:51 -0800

What Mac OS X software will let me scan things using my second hand Canon ImageRunner C5800 networked printer/scanner? There's PC software available, but I'd rather not have to run XP just to scan things. Note: if I sound clueless I am; if I'm missing something obvious then please tell me.

OSX can't see my XP drive

middleclasstool — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 11:50:15 -0800

Suddenly my Mac can't see my Windows PC, and I'm stumped. So I have a Windows PC (XP, latest service pack) and a new Macbook Pro (latest up-to-date version of Leopard). When I first got the Mac I was able to connect to my XP drive over wifi just fine by going to Finder and choosing "Connect to server" and typing in smb://bill (Bill's the XP PC's name, natch).

But suddenly it's not working anymore and I'm stumped. When I try to connect, using either that PC's name or IP address, it says it can't connect. When I ping that IP address, it sees it just fine.

The only thing I can think was awhile back I attempted directly connecting a Linux box to the Win PC to try to share its wifi connection. I did some tweaking of local network settings, but it never worked quite right, so I reverted changes. It could well be that something is still configured incorrectly on the Windows box, but damned if I can see what.

Any ideas?

Network Knowledge

djgh — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 15:40:01 -0800

How can I analyse and understand what's going on with my PeerGuardian logs? How can I understand various network commands (e.g. ping, traceroute etc.)? I use PeerGuardian (OS X version), and even when I'm just surfing the internet it's adding to its logs telling me it's blocked various things.

e.g.

Sun Apr 12 2009 23:31:42.447 BST -Blck- 172.xx.xx.xx:xxx (netbios-ns) -> local:xxx (netbios-ns) udp4 'nmbd (xxx)' (Bogon:Ads, Spyware, Bogon, etc)

I'm assuming this means that it's blocked IP 172.xx... from accessing port xxx on my machine?

So taking things a step further, what can I do to work out 'who' this is? I've heard of ping and traceroute, and have a vague understanding of what they do - what else could I use just to gather info for purely academic purposes (i.e. - "ok, I understand what's going on, this black box makes sense to me now", rather than "I want to pwn joo with my l337 skillz!!11!)

Finally, I used to have (back when I was on Windows) what was essentially traceroute on a map (kinda like that scene in Goldeneye when they work out that Boris is in Cuba). Is there anything like that around for OS X? (it looked really cool, even if its utility was suspect)

Windows won't serve to Mac

airplain — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 09:45:41 -0800

Problem: OSX to Windows direct-wired ethernet connection works, but the Mac can't see the shared PC drives. The PC and the Mac are both normally on wifi but the Mac's Airport is turned off now. Both machines have manual addresses set on their ethernet NICs, with direct CAT5 cable between the two; PC = 10.0.0.1/255.255.255.0; Mac=10.0.0.2/255.255.255.0. (The cable isn't a crossover, because OSX now manages that.) Ping works in both directions (i.e. from either machine to the other.) I want to connect from the Mac to the PC's share D, so I do flower-K to connect to smb://10.0.0.1/D.

First time I tried the Mac's dialog showed "Connecting" then radio buttons for 'guest' or "name + password". Because the PC's guest account was off I tried the PC's name+pw but OSX rejected it (and other names+pws) and said "not allowed..." [NOT the exact words, and I can no longer get this dialog].

I enabled the PC's guest a/c and tried the guest radiobutton on the Mac's Connect to Server. No success. Now the Mac doesn't ask for name and pw at all, and there's no guest/ID+PW choice nor radiobutton. Every time I try to connect from Mac to smb://10.0.0.1/D (or other share on the PC) the response after trying to connect is "Connection Failed. You do not have permission to access this server."

Windows Local Security Settings policies are not assigned. Do I need to change any other security settings?

As mentioned Airport is disabled on the Mac, but it's active on the PC. Another Mac here can share the PC just fine over wireless; no problem logging in - pretty much any username+pw works, it's not picky.

I need a fast connection though, to get stuff onto the new goodness of Mac (fresh yesterday. Yum.)

Hw/software: Macbook 13"; 2.1 GHz core duo; 1GB; internal NIC; running MacOS X .5.2. Windows XP Pro sp2 on homebuilt PC (ASUS mobo, Athlon 1500+ @ 1.3 GHz) 512 MB; Intel PRO/100 NIC. (Both OSes have current updates.)

Remote Control Tiger: How do I remote into a 10.4 box from Windows?

GS1977 — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 11:04:08 -0800

What is the best way to remote desktop into OS X 10.4 from a Windows Server 2003 AD environment? We are running workstations with Vista Business on a LAN with Win Server 2003 and ActiveDirectory. I have a G5 running 10.4 Server on the domain, but now I'd like to know the best way to remote control the G5. Our goal is to keep it in the server room as a test machine and possibly a web server. I need to be able to fully administer it from my desk.

We don't need no stinkin' macs!

Anonymous — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 04:50:22 -0800

I need help in stopping my campus IT group from their hostile tolerance of macs to outright banning of them on campus though a multi-platform environment is supported in the rest of the university system. Long explanation to follow... I can refute portions of it outright however, I am not a Novell network person and I do not want to tip the faculty's hands in further negotiations. We are being steamrolled by IT because we have no networking backgrounds to refute their arguments credibly. In essence, it is being stated that Novell cannot handle multi-platform environments. Here are the main points I am not sure how to answer:

• Non Centralized Users accounts
o Each Mac requires that the staff accounts are made on the local machine. On the PC workstations accounts are made on the servers, and when the faculty or staff logs on an account is made for the user. Each user needs their account manually generated; additional users will not be able to login to the machine until a local account is made. If the primary user is gone and the machines needs to be accessed an account needs to be made on the MAC for additional people to access it.
• No common shared drives with the PC workstations
o Documents need to be emailed, or copied to external media to be shared.
o An additional server is needed to handle file shares for Publications – to provide file sharing for additional Mac users, additional servers will be necessary and additional costs incurred for managing and maintaining these servers.
 Accounts on this server must be manually created, and passwords manually synced. The accounts on the server and the accounts on the Mac workstation are not the same. When a user changes their password they need to be changed in both locations.

• Printing
o No central tracking is available.

• Hard drive Data Security Issues
o In case of stolen laptop privacy issues could be a concern. If a hacker has physical access to a computer no matter what the operating system is MAC, Windows, or Linux the system will become compromised.
o In the coming months a product called PointSec is coming to encrypt the hard drive of Laptops. We are required to utilize this software across all university systems. This product is not available for Mac users.
• Assets Management
o Macs do not work ZenWorks Assets management system, that is being deployed to help with managing the university’s computer assets and software licensing.

The new Intel based Macs can dual boot Windows or Mac OS. For years people have been duel booting with Linux and Windows. Dual booting does have issues. For the Mac to be truly integrated into the University computer network it will need to booted into Windows while on campus.
Some of the main possible problems with dual booting are:
• The hard drive needs to be partitioned, and if the sizes are not set right one OS can run out of disk space.
• When booted into MAC the OS can only natively read files from the Windows partition. For example a word document that was last edited while in Windows and saved to the My Documents folder will need to be saved to the Mac partition for the edits to be saved.
• Windows does not natively read the MAC OS file system. Reading a file that is saved to the MAC partition is not possible.

Using an emulator such as VMware or Parallels does work well. A Windows XP license will need to be purchased, causing additional cost to the university. The problem with accessing the files from each OS still occurs even if one of these tools is utilized.

I am so sorry for the length but I just don't know what to do in putting together an argument of this nature. There has been no demonstrations or machine put up. Most of the other arguments, not shown, can be countered with "its on the university portal" but the networking questions are beyond me.

Campus uses Novell including web client and ZenWorks.

Thanks for all your help. If you want the whole document or want further details. please use this email: macsoncampus@gmail.com

Can we read the same email without tears?

al_fresco — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 11:48:49 -0800

Help me use email in a multi-user environment. IMAP is great, but not for more than one user at a time. My boss operates a business where people register for classes through a website. An HTML form generates an email. Administrator checks email for registration details and enters details in a (hosted) FileMaker database, which then sends confirmation email.

All of this worked fine when all of the business could be dealt with by one person, or even one person at a time. Now, the business has grown to the point where there is often a need for two people to be processing the emails at one time, two people at two different desks in two different locations. We have an IMAP email account, and messages are often duplicated when both email clients (Mail.app) are connected at the same time. We also use third-party software (MailTags) to add keywords and notes to individual emails. We now minimize the errors by turning off automatic synching, but there are still collisions and gaps. Users communicate via iChat.

The business is not large enough to warrant shelling out for expensive large-scale enterprise solution. We want the ability to have two or more people at two or more workstations accessing the same information from the same email account at the same time, and to be able to make other users aware of the actions they have taken on those emails, without having to create a separate log.

The hosted FileMaker database works well enough (two users can update the database at the same time, just not the same record). Is there a similar solution for email? Should we somehow route the email account through its own hosted FM database and work from that?

Ideas? Thoughts? Thanks!

Bandwidth monitoring tool needed.

jammnrose — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 16:39:06 -0800

I'm looking for a bandwidth monitoring tool for OSX. I need it to do some specific things. I need it to do these things:
Keep track of the bandwidth used in the past 24 hours (ie, a rolling count by the minute).
Monitor internal and external bandwidth separately.
Monitor Airport/Ethernet separately/singly.
Any ideas? Thanks.

Triggering stuff after connecting to a network

uncle harold — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 05:51:47 -0800

OS X: Automatically trigger actions after connecting to a network. I often change networks during the day, and always connect to my office network through a VPN. I want to automate the process to do something like this:

1) After connecting to an arbitrary network, connect to my VPN
2) Mount a share on the VPN
3) When going to sleep mode, unmount share and disconnect from VPN

I have so far only found pearPort. It's a step in the right direction, but it does only work for WLAN, not for Bluetooth (cellphone modem) nor Ethernet. It also only connects to a VPN, and can't trigger other actions.

The ideal solution would be something that simply listens to new connections, and can be configured to then call arbitrary apps/applescripts, as that would be the most flexible solution.

Does something like this exist?

Help me sell XServe to my boss and our client.

odinsdream — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 13:33:57 -0800

Help me recommend XServe to my boss and our client. Please share your personal experience with the XServe hardware and software, particularly the GUI tools for service management. I work for a small business that provides technical support for a local school. They have a very small IT budget, and no IT staff (except for select volunteer students).

Currently, they have two 7-10 year old NT 4.0 servers. One is running Exchange, and the other is just used as file storage.

I have no personal experience with the XServe, but reading their specifications, it seems to fit what this school is looking to do. For the most part, I'd like to know about any caveats with recommending this system and software to my boss, and to the school, that otherwise aren't obvious from reading the specs and reviews.

I'm a bit concerned that it doesn't yet have iCal Server built in, but could I install some web-based software while we wait for the release?

What won't this server be able to do for them? The biggest hurdle I need to overcome is the momentum generated from my boss' sole experience working with Exchange and Windows servers. He's open to the idea, but seems to only vaguely understand that Macs aren't locked-off in some proprietary realm apart from Windows machines anymore.

Personal opinions, experiences, and thoughts on such a recommendation?

Thanks!

Quick fix iMac as monitor for another Apple.

Bengston — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 13:16:32 -0800

Is there any way that I can easily use my iMac Desktop (Current Intel Model) monitor as a second or primary monitor for my Powerbook using either the wireless network or a monitor adapter? Would using some sort of remote desktop allow me to utilize all the extra monitor space? I just want to use some software that I have on my 12" Powerbook on my friends much larger monitor that is unfortunately also attached to his iMac. Thanks.

How to move iTunes and iPhoto libraries to a network drive?

drgonzo2k2 — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 17:53:11 -0800

What is the easiest way to move my iTunes and iPhoto libraries from an external USB drive to a network drive? Currently I have both my iTunes and iPhoto libraries stored on an external HD that is connected by USB to my Mac Mini. My wife and I share the same libraries. To achieve that, I've done the following:

1. All files are stored in a "music" and "photos" folder on the external drive.

2. I created aliases of those folders and renamed them "iTunes" and "iPhoto Library"

3. I then replaced those folders with the aliases in my wife's and my user directories.

This means that the media and the library files are all on the external drive, and we didn't have to work any voodoo to get iTunes and iPhoto to recognize the libraries.

Now that this HD is full, and we're only going to acquire more content, and possibly more computers, I decided to build a home server and keep all the files there. I've bought an old G4 dual processor for this purpose, and I have outfitted it with 1TB of RAID-5 storage. Now what would be the easiest way to transfer my libraries to the RAID and not lose anything? Here's what I was thinking:

1. Since everything is on a USB drive, just hook it up to the G4 and use RsyncX to copy the movies and photos folders to the RAID.

2. Map the network drive, and set it as a login item on both accounts.

3. Again, create the aliases and place them in our user folders as above.

My main concern is that the files will by physically located on a different drive, so will that end up messing up my library files? I mean, will it know where the files are? If not, can someone walk me through an easy process of achieving this?

who watches the watchees?

luriete — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 12:07:52 -0800

Can anyone recommend easy to install, cross platform monitoring software for Mac OS X - that is, something that would allow a parent, employer or teacher to, from their PC, monitor the screen of a Macintosh? Will remote desktop do this? Is it relatively easy to install?

Take the internet brakes off an iMac

NinjaTadpole — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 04:53:29 -0800

iMac G4 has really slow internet speed, PC on the same network is zippy - how do I track the problem and squish it? The network is just these two machines: 1 PC (Win2K), 1 iMac (OSX 10.3.9). They both go through a router, however while the PC connects wirelessly, the iMac is plugged straight into the box.

I've got IPNetMonitorX to help me find what's loose, but unfortunately only about bugger all experience in network admin. I've found that pings work across the network, but only sometimes work for targets on the internet... and that's sort of where I get stuck.

The OSX firewall is off, there are no DNS settings on either machine to get confused by (the router handles this), I really can't spot what's amiss - can you help me debug?

firewalled?

anadem — Sun, 24 Sep 2006 12:51:30 -0800

What might be blocking downloads on my friend's Macbook? My friend's Macbook Pro gets internet over our home wifi net (after tedious tweaking, but I don't think I damaged anything). She can get surf the web, but downloads seem blocked. Eg trying to get VLC, we go to the VideoLan page and click through to the download link for OSX from the Optralan mirror. This opens the page saying "Click here if your download does not start" but gets no further --no download happens at all, though it gets no error message in Safari or Firefox. (FF's download manager doesn't open either.)

My Powerbook works fine here, so I'm guessing it must be a setting on her machine, but I don't know where to look for what. Her machine is a few months old and has been fiddled with by people who know even less than I do.

I haven't been able to find out if downloads work when she's at other places -- she doesn't know.

Fwiw our wifi router is a DLink DI-614 and NAT is on an XP box (which talks IP to a satellite). My PB runs 10.3, her MP is 10.4 of course.

(And how do I stop her machine assuming that having the mouse pointer hover over a button means I want the machine to press the button for me -- this is so incredibly annoying!)

Help me choose a file server OS

humuhumu — Mon, 24 Apr 2006 10:35:34 -0800

Home network consists of two XP machines, an OSX laptop, and an Ubuntu laptop. Have just been given an old PIII to use as a file server. What OS should the file server run and what should I use to format the disks?

Why won't my LAN and WAN play together?

holgate — Sat, 18 Mar 2006 08:10:20 -0800

I can share files over SMB on a local network, or do stuff on the internets -- but not at the same time. How can I make the LAN and WAN play nice? The kit: WinXP Pro serving the SMB shares, Linksys WRT54G router with HyperWRT, iBook connecting wirelessly.

I can mount the SMB shares on the iBook, but as soon as I do anything with the WAN -- browse the web, check email -- the connection drops like a stone. It means I can't transfer files or work with remote files without ensuring that I won't receive stray packets from the outside world. I've tried different router firmwares, checked firewalls, and done all the usual network diagnostics. Any idea what might be up?

Painfully slow internet connection on OS X...

dobbs — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 13:17:54 -0800

Is it possible to test an iMac's (OS X) network card? Other suggestions for why I'm getting a slow Net connection? My computer was working fine (iMac G5) until a few weeks ago when something happened with the display. I checked into it and found a press release from Apple that computers with my serial number had a defective something re: video so I brought it in to be fixed.

So, now I have it back (after 10 days without) and the internet connection is painfully slow. I spoke to my service provider (high speed cable connection) and the guy says that when he pings my modem it's all working fine but when he pings my particular computer he gets packet loss (100 packets sent, 62 returned).

He says that he thinks something is wrong with my network card. I have no idea how to check it or its settings without bringing it back to the Apple store (very time consuming and not at all convenient without a car).

Mefites -- any suggestions for things I can try at home before resorting to the store?

Sharing is good, and should be easy!

Third — Mon, 29 Aug 2005 23:15:24 -0800

How do I share only certain folders in OS X when I enable Windows Sharing? I live in an aparment with three other guys, and we want to share our music from all four hard drives to a fifth computer that is downstairs and connected to the surround sound.

How can I tell OS X to only share my Public folder, or my Music folder, or any other folder that I want. The default seems to share my entire Home folder, which is definitely not what I want!

I installed the Sharepoints preference pane today in order to share an external drive, but when I checked the workgroup on my roommate's computer, my Home directory was available! I had to enter my password and such to access it, but even after I disable Windows Sharing in OS X System Preferences, the folder was still available! I could not figure out how to restrict access to the directory after my user name and password had been entered.

What is going on? All I want to do is share my external volume that is attached to my Powerbook with a Windows network, and nothing else. I have sensitive documents in my Home folder, not to mention the security risk of my *entire* Library directory being available on the network.

Any help with customizing the shared folders in OS X or using Sharepoints a little more efficiently would be greatly appreciated!

Win2K/OSX Sharing

five fresh fish — Tue, 16 Aug 2005 19:02:15 -0800

Switching: moving my Win2K files to Mac OSX. How?! I've been beating my head against a wall all afternoon, trying to set up file sharing between my two laptops. They are both connected via wireless to an SMC "SMC Barricade Turbo Turbo Wireless Cable/DSL Broadband Router". I have enabled file and printer sharing on the Win2K box, I have shared the drives, I have made sure my account has a password, I have disabled firewalls, I've made sure ping works, I have jumped through many a hoop.

But not the right hoop.

Please hope me!

How do I get a WASTE network working on a Mac?

hughbot — Thu, 13 Jan 2005 17:45:36 -0800

WASTEfilter: I'm trying to set up a WASTE network with my buddy, and we can't seem to get it to work at all. I'm running the client on OS X, and he's using Windows. We've sent each other our keys, but we can't seem to get the two to communicate. I can't really find any good sources of info for WASTE on the Mac, does anyone know if it works?

How can I print from my Mac to a Windows network printer?

skylar — Wed, 01 Dec 2004 05:10:01 -0800

Can you advise on printing to a Windows PC printer from a Mac OSX machine, over a network? [more inside...] I have a Lexmark P707 printer, attached to a Windows XP computer by USB. It works fine. I have set it as shared on my local area network. I have also set up Print Services for Unix on the XP box just for good measure.

I have a pretty good feeling that another Windows machine would be able to see the shared printer. However, I am interested in printing to the Windows printer from my Apple Mac OS 10.3.5 machine.

When I try and add a printer, the Mac doesn't "see" the printer within the Windows Printing dialogue... nor can I seem to figure out the correct printer address to use in the UP Printing (LPD/LPR) area.

Lexmark won't help me on a networking issue, unfortunately. Google has some stuff on PC/Mac print networking but a lot of it is old and out of date. Has anyone figured this out? Is there some hack or workaround I could try? Many thanks for your help.