path: root/docs/faq/sambafaq.txt

  Samba FAQ
  Paul Blackman, ictinus@lake.canberra.edu.au
  , v 0.5

  This is the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) document for Samba, the
  free and very popular SMB server product. An SMB server allows file
  and printer connections from clients such as Windows, OS/2, Linux and
  others. Current to version 1.9.16. Please send any corrections to the
  author.
  ______________________________________________________________________

  Table of Contents:

  1.      General Information

  1.1.    What is Samba?

  1.2.    What is the current version of Samba?

  1.3.    Where can I get it?

  1.4.    What do the version numbers mean?

  1.5.    What platforms are supported?

  1.6.    How can I find out more about Samba?

  1.7.    Something's gone wrong - what should I do?

  1.8.    Pizza supply details

  2.      Compiling and installing Samba on a Unix host

  2.1.    I can't see the Samba server in any browse lists!

  2.2.    Some files that I KNOW are on the server doesn't show up when
  I view the files from my client!

  2.3.    Some files on the server show up with really wierd filenames
  when I view the files from my client!

  2.4.    My client reports "cannot locate specified computer" or
  similar

  2.5.    My client reports "cannot locate specified share name" or
  similar

  2.6.    My client reports "cannot find domain controller", "cannot log
  on to the network" or similar

  2.7.    Printing doesn't work :-(

  2.8.    My programs install on the server OK, but refuse to work
  properly

  2.9.    My "server string" doesn't seem to be recognised

  2.10.   My client reports "This server is not configured to list
  shared resources"

  2.11.   Log message "you appear to have a trapdoor uid system"

  3.      Common client questions

  3.1.    Are any Macintosh clients for Samba

  3.2.    "Session request failed (131,130)" error

  3.3.    How do I synchronise my PC's clock with my Samba server?

  3.4.    Problems with WinDD, NTrigue, WinCenterPro etc

  3.5.    Problem with printers under NT

  3.6.    Why are my file's timestamps off by an hour, or by a few
  hours?

  3.7.    How do I set the printer driver name correctly?

  4.      Specific client application problems

  4.1.    MS Office Setup reports "Cannot change properties of
  "MSOFFICEUP.INI"

  5.      Miscellaneous
  ______________________________________________________________________

  1.  General Information

  All about Samba - what it is, how to get it, related sources of
  information, how to understand the version numbering scheme, pizza
  details

  1.1.  What is Samba?

  Samba is a suite of programs which work together to allow clients to
  access to a server's filespace and printers via the SMB (Server
  Message Block) protocol. Initially written for Unix, Samba now also
  runs on Netware, OS/2 and VMS.

  In practice, this means that you can redirect disks and printers to
  Unix disks and printers from Lan Manager clients, Windows for
  Workgroups 3.11 clients, Windows NT clients, Linux clients and OS/2
  clients. There is also a generic Unix client program supplied as part
  of the suite which allows Unix users to use an ftp-like interface to
  access filespace and printers on any other SMB servers. This gives the
  capability for these operating systems to behave much like a LAN
  Server or Windows NT Server machine, only with added functionality and
  flexibility designed to make life easier for administrators.

  The components of the suite are (in summary):

  o  smbd, the SMB server. This handles actual connections from clients,
     doing all the file, permission and username work

  o  nmbd, the Netbios name server, which helps clients locate servers,
     doing the browsing work and managing domains as this capability is
     being built into Samba

  o  smbclient, the Unix-hosted client program

  o  smbrun, a little 'glue' program to help the server run external
     programs

  o  testprns, a program to test server access to printers

  o  testparms, a program to test the Samba configuration file for
     correctness

  o  smb.conf, the Samba configuration file

  o  smbprint, a sample script to allow a Unix host to use smbclient to
     print to an SMB server

  o  documentation! DON'T neglect to read it - you will save a great
     deal of time!

  The suite is supplied with full source (of course!) and is GPLed.

  The primary creator of the Samba suite is Andrew Tridgell. Later
  versions incorporate much effort by many net.helpers. The man pages
  and this FAQ were originally written by Karl Auer.

  1.2.  What is the current version of Samba?

  At time of writing, the current version was 1.9.16. If you want to be
  sure check the bottom of the change-log file.
  <ftp://samba.anu.edu.au/pub/samba/alpha/change-log>

  For more information see ``What do the version numbers mean?''

  1.3.  Where can I get it?

  The Samba suite is available via anonymous ftp from samba.anu.edu.au.
  The latest and greatest versions of the suite are in the directory:

  /pub/samba/

  Development (read "alpha") versions, which are NOT necessarily stable
  and which do NOT necessarily have accurate documentation, are
  available in the directory:

  /pub/samba/alpha

  Note that binaries are NOT included in any of the above. Samba is
  distributed ONLY in source form, though binaries may be available from
  other sites. Recent versions of some Linux distributions, for example,
  do contain Samba binaries for that platform.

  1.4.  What do the version numbers mean?

  It is not recommended that you run a version of Samba with the word
  "alpha" in its name unless you know what you are doing and are willing
  to do some debugging. Many, many people just get the latest
  recommended stable release version and are happy. If you are brave, by
  all means take the plunge and help with the testing and development -
  but don't install it on your departmental server. Samba is typically
  very stable and safe, and this is mostly due to the policy of many
  public releases.

  How the scheme works:

  1) when major changes are made the version number is increased. For
  example, the transition from 1.9.15 to 1.9.16. However, this version
  number will not appear immediately and people should continue to use
  1.9.15 for production systems (see next point.)

  2) just after major changes are made the software is considered
  unstable, and a series of alpha releases are distributed, for example
  1.9.16alpha1. These are for testing by those who know what they are
  doing.  The "alpha" in the filename will hopefully scare off those who
  are just looking for the latest version to install.

  3) when Andrew thinks that the alphas have stabilised to the point
  where he would recommend new users install it, he renames it to the
  same version number without the alpha, for example 1.9.16.

  4) inevitably bugs are found in the "stable" releases and minor patch
  levels are released which give us the pXX series, for example
  1.9.16p2.

  So the progression goes:

  1.9.15p7        (production) 1.9.15p8        (production) 1.9.16alpha1
  (test sites only) : 1.9.16alpha20   (test sites only) 1.9.16
  (production) 1.9.16p1        (production)

  The above system means that whenever someone looks at the samba ftp
  site they will be able to grab the highest numbered release without an
  alpha in the name and be sure of getting the current recommended
  version.

  1.5.  What platforms are supported?

  Many different platforms have run Samba successfully. The platforms
  most widely used and thus best tested are Linux and SunOS.

  At time of writing, the Makefile claimed support for:

  * SunOS * Linux with shadow passwords * Linux without shadow passwords
  * SOLARIS * SOLARIS 2.2 and above (aka SunOS 5) * SVR4 * ULTRIX * OSF1
  (alpha only) * OSF1 with NIS and Fast Crypt (alpha only) * OSF1 V2.0
  Enhanced Security (alpha only) * AIX * BSDI * NetBSD * NetBSD 1.0 *
  SEQUENT * HP-UX * SGI * SGI IRIX 4.x.x * SGI IRIX 5.x.x * FreeBSD *
  NeXT 3.2 and above * NeXT OS 2.x * NeXT OS 3.0 * ISC SVR3V4 (POSIX
  mode) * ISC SVR3V4 (iBCS2 mode) * A/UX 3.0 * SCO with shadow
  passwords.  * SCO with shadow passwords, without YP.  * SCO with TCB
  passwords * SCO 3.2v2 (ODT 1.1) with TCP passwords * intergraph * DGUX
  * Apollo Domain/OS sr10.3 (BSD4.3)

  1.6.  How can I find out more about Samba?

  There are two mailing lists devoted to discussion of Samba-related
  matters.  There is also the newsgroup, comp.protocols.smb, which has a
  great deal of discussion on Samba. There is also a WWW site 'SAMBA Web
  Pages' at http://samba.canberra.edu.au/pub/samba/samba.html, under
  which there is a comprehensive survey of Samba users. Another useful
  resource is the hypertext archive of the Samba mailing list.

  Send email to listproc@samba.anu.edu.au. Make sure the subject line is
  blank, and include the following two lines in the body of the message:

  subscribe samba Firstname Lastname subscribe samba-announce Firstname
  Lastname

  Obviously you should substitute YOUR first name for "Firstname" and
  YOUR last name for "Lastname"! Try not to send any signature stuff, it
  sometimes confuses the list processor.

  The samba list is a digest list - every eight hours or so it
  regurgitates a single message containing all the messages that have
  been received by the list since the last time and sends a copy of this
  message to all subscribers.

  If you stop being interested in Samba, please send another email to
  listproc@samba.anu.edu.au. Make sure the subject line is blank, and
  include the following two lines in the body of the message:

  unsubscribe samba unsubscribe samba-announce

  The From: line in your message MUST be the same address you used when
  you subscribed.

  1.7.  Something's gone wrong - what should I do?

  # *** IMPORTANT! *** # DO NOT post messages on mailing lists or in
  newsgroups until you have carried out the first three steps given
  here!

  Firstly, see if there are any likely looking entries in this FAQ! If
  you have just installed Samba, have you run through the checklist in
  DIAGNOSIS.txt? It can save you a lot of time and effort.

  Secondly, read the man pages for smbd, nmbd and smb.conf, looking for
  topics that relate to what you are trying to do.

  Thirdly, if there is no obvious solution to hand, try to get a look at
  the log files for smbd and/or nmbd for the period during which you
  were having problems. You may need to reconfigure the servers to
  provide more extensive debugging information - usually level 2 or
  level 3 provide ample debugging info. Inspect these logs closely,
  looking particularly for the string "Error:".

  Fourthly, if you still haven't got anywhere, ask the mailing list or
  newsgroup.  In general nobody minds answering questions provided you
  have followed the preceding steps. It might be a good idea to scan the
  archives of the mailing list, which are available through the Samba
  web site described in the previous section.

  If you successfully solve a problem, please mail the FAQ maintainer a
  succinct description of the symptom, the problem and the solution, so
  I can incorporate it in the next version.

  If you make changes to the source code, _please_ submit these patches
  so that everyone else gets the benefit of your work. This is one of
  the most important aspects to the maintainence of Samba. Send all
  patches to samba-bugs@samba.anu.edu.au, not Andrew Tridgell or any
  other individual and not the samba team mailing list.

  1.8.  Pizza supply details

  Those who have registered in the Samba survey as "Pizza Factory" will
  already know this, but the rest may need some help. Andrew doesn't ask
  for payment, but he does appreciate it when people give him pizza.
  This calls for a little organisation when the pizza donor is twenty
  thousand kilometres away, but it has been done.

  Method 1: Ring up your local branch of an international pizza chain
  and see if they honour their vouchers internationally. Pizza Hut do,
  which is how the entire Canberra Linux Users Group got to eat pizza
  one night, courtesy of someone in the US

  Method 2: Ring up a local pizza shop in Canberra and quote a credit
  card number for a certain amount, and tell them that Andrew will be
  collecting it (don't forget to tell him.) One kind soul from Germany
  did this.

  Method 3: Purchase a pizza voucher from your local pizza shop that has
  no international affiliations and send it to Andrew. It is completely
  useless but he can hang it on the wall next to the one he already has
  from Germany :-)

  Method 4: Air freight him a pizza with your favourite regional
  flavours. It will probably get stuck in customs or torn apart by
  hungry sniffer dogs but it will have been a noble gesture.

  2.  Compiling and installing Samba on a Unix host

  2.1.  I can't see the Samba server in any browse lists!

  *** Until the FAQ can be updated, please check the file: ***
  ftp://samba.anu.edu.au/pub/samba/BROWSING.txt *** for more information
  on browsing.

  If your GUI client does not permit you to select non-browsable
  servers, you may need to do so on the command line. For example, under
  Lan Manager you might connect to the above service as disk drive M:
  thusly:

  net use M: \maryed

  The details of how to do this and the specific syntax varies from
  client to client - check your client's documentation.

  2.2.  view the files from my client!  Some files that I KNOW are on
  the server doesn't show up when I

  2.3.  I view the files from my client!  Some files on the server show
  up with really wierd filenames when

  If you check what files are not showing up, you will note that they
  are files which contain upper case letters or which are otherwise not
  DOS-compatible (ie, they are not legal DOS filenames for some reason).

  The Samba server can be configured either to ignore such files
  completely, or to present them to the client in "mangled" form. If you
  are not seeing the files at all, the Samba server has most likely been
  configured to ignore them.  Consult the man page smb.conf(5) for
  details of how to change this - the parameter you need to set is
  "mangled names = yes".

  2.4.  My client reports "cannot locate specified computer" or similar

  This indicates one of three things: You supplied an incorrect server
  name, the underlying TCP/IP layer is not working correctly, or the
  name you specified cannot be resolved.

  After carefully checking that the name you typed is the name you
  should have typed, try doing things like pinging a host or telnetting
  to somewhere on your network to see if TCP/IP is functioning OK. If it
  is, the problem is most likely name resolution.

  If your client has a facility to do so, hardcode a mapping between the
  hosts IP and the name you want to use. For example, with Man Manager
  or Windows for Workgroups you would put a suitable entry in the file
  LMHOSTS. If this works, the problem is in the communication between
  your client and the netbios name server. If it does not work, then
  there is something fundamental wrong with your naming and the solution
  is beyond the scope of this document.

  If you do not have any server on your subnet supplying netbios name
  resolution, hardcoded mappings are your only option. If you DO have a
  netbios name server running (such as the Samba suite's nmbd program),
  the problem probably lies in the way it is set up. Refer to Section
  Two of this FAQ for more ideas.

  By the way, remember to REMOVE the hardcoded mapping before further
  tests :-)

  2.5.  similar My client reports "cannot locate specified share name"
  or

  This message indicates that your client CAN locate the specified
  server, which is a good start, but that it cannot find a service of
  the name you gave.

  The first step is to check the exact name of the service you are
  trying to connect to (consult your system administrator). Assuming it
  exists and you specified it correctly (read your client's doco on how
  to specify a service name correctly), read on:

  * Many clients cannot accept or use service names longer than eight
  characters.  * Many clients cannot accept or use service names
  containing spaces.  * Some servers (not Samba though) are case
  sensitive with service names.  * Some clients force service names into
  upper case.

  2.6.  on to the network" or similar My client reports "cannot find
  domain controller", "cannot log

  Nothing is wrong - Samba does not implement the primary domain name
  controller stuff for several reasons, including the fact that the
  whole concept of a primary domain controller and "logging in to a
  network" doesn't fit well with clients possibly running on multiuser
  machines (such as users of smbclient under Unix). Having said that,
  several developers are working hard on building it in to the next
  major version of Samba. If you can contribute, send a message to
  samba-bugs!

  Seeing this message should not affect your ability to mount redirected
  disks and printers, which is really what all this is about.

  For many clients (including Windows for Workgroups and Lan Manager),
  setting the domain to STANDALONE at least gets rid of the message.

  2.7.  Printing doesn't work :-(

  Make sure that the specified print command for the service you are
  connecting to is correct and that it has a fully-qualified path (eg.,
  use "/usr/bin/lpr" rather than just "lpr").

  Make sure that the spool directory specified for the service is
  writable by the user connected to the service. In particular the user
  "nobody" often has problems with printing, even if it worked with an
  earlier version of Samba. Try creating another guest user other than
  "nobody".

  Make sure that the user specified in the service is permitted to use
  the printer.

  Check the debug log produced by smbd. Search for the printer name and
  see if the log turns up any clues. Note that error messages to do with
  a service ipc$ are meaningless - they relate to the way the client
  attempts to retrieve status information when using the LANMAN1
  protocol.

  If using WfWg then you need to set the default protocol to TCP/IP, not
  Netbeui. This is a WfWg bug.

  If using the Lanman1 protocol (the default) then try switching to
  coreplus.  Also not that print status error messages don't mean
  printing won't work. The print status is received by a different
  mechanism.

  2.8.  My programs install on the server OK, but refuse to work prop-
  erly

  There are numerous possible reasons for this, but one MAJOR
  possibility is that your software uses locking. Make sure you are
  using Samba 1.6.11 or later. It may also be possible to work around
  the problem by setting "locking=no" in the Samba configuration file
  for the service the software is installed on. This should be regarded
  as a strictly temporary solution.

  In earlier Samba versions there were some difficulties with the very
  latest Microsoft products, particularly Excel 5 and Word for Windows
  6. These should have all been solved. If not then please let Andrew
  Tridgell know.

  2.9.  My "server string" doesn't seem to be recognised

  my client reports the default setting, eg. "Samba 1.9.15p4", instead
  of what I have changed it to in the smb.conf file.

  You need to use the -C option in nmbd. The "server string" affects
  what smbd puts out and -C affects what nmbd puts out. In a future
  version these will probably be combined and -C will be removed, but
  for now use -C

  2.10.  resources" My client reports "This server is not configured to
  list shared

  Your guest account is probably invalid for some reason. Samba uses the
  guest account for browsing in smbd.  Check that your guest account is
  valid.

  See also 'guest account' in smb.conf man page.

  2.11.  Log message "you appear to have a trapdoor uid system"

  This can have several causes. It might be because you are using a uid
  or gid of 65535 or -1. This is a VERY bad idea, and is a big security
  hole. Check carefully in your /etc/passwd file and make sure that no
  user has uid 65535 or -1. Especially check the "nobody" user, as many
  broken systems are shipped with nobody setup with a uid of 65535.

  It might also mean that your OS has a trapdoor uid/gid system :-)

  This means that once a process changes effective uid from root to
  another user it can't go back to root. Unfortunately Samba relies on
  being able to change effective uid from root to non-root and back
  again to implement its security policy. If your OS has a trapdoor uid
  system this won't work, and several things in Samba may break. Less
  things will break if you use user or server level security instead of
  the default share level security, but you may still strike problems.

  The problems don't give rise to any security holes, so don't panic,
  but it does mean some of Samba's capabilities will be unavailable.  In
  particular you will not be able to connect to the Samba server as two
  different uids at once. This may happen if you try to print as a
  "guest" while accessing a share as a normal user. It may also affect
  your ability to list the available shares as this is normally done as
  the guest user.

  Complain to your OS vendor and ask them to fix their system.

  Note: the reason why 65535 is a VERY bad choice of uid and gid is that
  it casts to -1 as a uid, and the setreuid() system call ignores (with
  no error) uid changes to -1. This means any daemon attempting to run
  as uid 65535 will actually run as root. This is not good!

  3.  Common client questions

  3.1.  Are any Macintosh clients for Samba

  In Rob Newberry's words (rob@eats.com, Sun, 4 Dec 1994):

  The answer is "No." Samba speaks SMB, the protocol used for Microsoft
  networks.  The Macintosh has ALWAYS spoken Appletalk. Even with
  Microsoft "services for Macintosh", it has been a matter of making the
  server speak Appletalk. It is the same for Novell Netware and the
  Macintosh, although I believe Novell has (VERY LATE) released an
  extension for the Mac to let it speak IPX.

  In future Apple System Software, you may see support for other
  protocols, such as SMB -- Applet is working on a new networking
  architecture that will --> -- make it easier to support additional
  protocols. But it's not here yet.

  Now, the nice part is that if you want your Unix machine to speak
  Appletalk, there are several options. "Netatalk" and "CAP" are free,
  and available on the net. There are also several commercial options,
  such as "PacerShare" and "Helios" (I think). In any case, you'll have
  to look around for a server, not anything for the Mac.

  Depending on you OS, some of these may not help you. I am currently
  coordinating the effort to get CAP working with Native Ethertalk under
  Linux, but we're not done yet.

  [lkcl - update 09mar97 - the answer is "Yes!".  Thursby now have a
  CIFS Client / Server - see www.thursby.com.  They test it against
  Windows 95, Windows NT and samba for compatibility issues].

  3.2.  Session request failed (131,130)" error

  The following answer is provided by John E. Miller:

  I'll assume that you're able to ping back and forth between the
  machines by IP address and name, and that you're using some security
  model where you're confident that you've got user IDs and passwords
  right.  The logging options (-d3 or greater) can help a lot with that.
  DNS and WINS configuration can also impact connectivity as well.

  Now, on to 'scope id's.  Somewhere in your Win95 TCP/IP network
  configuration (I'm too much of an NT bigot to know where it's located
  in the Win95 setup, but I'll have to learn someday since I teach for a
  Microsoft Solution Provider Authorized Tech Education Center - what an
  acronym...) Note: It's under Control Panel | Network | TCP/IP | WINS
  Configuration there's a little text entry field called something like

  This field essentially creates 'invisible' sub-workgroups on the same
  wire.  Boxes can only see other boxes whose Scope IDs are set to the
  exact same value - it's sometimes used by OEMs to configure their
  boxes to browse only other boxes from the same vendor and, in most
  environments, this field should be left blank.  If you, in fact, have
  something in this box that EXACT value (case-sensitive!) needs to be
  provided to smbclient and nmbd as the -i (lowercase) parameter. So, if
  your Scope ID is configured as the string 'SomeStr' in Win95 then
  you'd have to use smbclient -iSomeStr otherparms in connecting to it.

  3.3.  How do I synchronise my PC's clock with my Samba server?

  To syncronize your PC's clock with your Samba server:

  * Copy timesync.pif to your windows directory * timesync.pif can be
  found at:
  http://samba.canberra.edu.au/pub/samba/binaries/miscellaneous/timesync.pif
  * Add timesync.pif to your 'Start Up' group/folder * Open the
  properties dialog box for the program/icon * Make sure the 'Run
  Minimized' option is set in program * Change the command line section
  that reads \sambahost to reflect the name of your server.  * Close the
  properties dialog box by choosing 'OK'

  Each time you start your computer (or login for Win95) your PC will
  synchronize it's clock with your Samba server.

  Alternatively, you can set up domain logons - see:
  ftp://samba.anu.edu.au/pub/samba/BROWSING.txt *** for more information.

  Then, add NET TIME \\%L /SET /YES as one of the lines in the logon script.

  3.4.  Problems with WinDD, NTrigue, WinCenterPro etc

  All of the above programs are applications that sit on an NT box and
  allow multiple users to access the NT GUI applications from remote
  workstations (often over X).

  What has this got to do with Samba? The problem comes when these users
  use filemanager to mount shares from a Samba server. The most common
  symptom is that the first user to connect get correct file permissions
  and has a nice day, but subsequent connections get logged in as the
  same user as the first person to login. They find that they cannot
  access files in their own home directory, but that they can access
  files in the first users home directory (maybe not such a nice day
  after all?)

  Why does this happen? The above products all share a common heritage
  (and code base I believe). They all open just a single TCP based SMB
  connection to the Samba server, and requests from all users are piped
  over this connection. This is unfortunate, but not fatal.

  It means that if you run your Samba server in share level security
  (the default) then things will definately break as described above.
  The share level SMB security model has no provision for multiple user
  IDs on the one SMB connection. See security_level.txt in the docs for
  more info on share/user/server level security.

  If you run in user or server level security then you have a chance,
  but only if you have a recent version of Samba (at least 1.9.15p6). In
  older versions bugs in Samba meant you still would have had problems.

  If you have a trapdoor uid system in your OS then it will never work
  properly. Samba needs to be able to switch uids on the connection and
  it can't if your OS has a trapdoor uid system. You'll know this
  because Samba will note it in your logs.

  Also note that you should not use the magic "homes" share name with
  products like these, as otherwise all users will end up with the same
  home directory. Use \serversername instead.

  3.5.  Problem with printers under NT

  This info from Stefan Hergeth hergeth@f7axp1.informatik.fh-muenchen.de
  may be useful:

  A network-printer (with ethernetcard) is connected to the NT-Clients
  via our UNIX-Fileserver (SAMBA-Server), like the configuration told by
  Matthew Harrell harrell@leech.nrl.navy.mil (see WinNT.txt)

  1.) If a user has choosen this printer as the default printer in his
  NT-Session and this printer is not connected to the network (e.g.
  switched off) than this user has a problem with the SAMBA- connection
  of his filesystems. It's very slow.

  2.) If the printer is connected to the network everything works fine.

  3.) When the smbd ist started with debug level 3, you can see that the
  NT spooling system try to connect to the printer many times. If the
  printer ist not connected to the network this request fails and the NT
  spooler is wasting a lot of time to connect to the printer service.
  This seems to be the reason for the slow network connection.

  4.) Maybe it's possible to change this behaviour by setting different
  printer properties in the Print-Manager-Menu of NT, but i didn't try
  it yet.

  3.6.  Why are my file's timestamps off by an hour, or by a few hours?

  This is from Paul Eggert eggert@twinsun.com.

  Most likely it's a problem with your time zone settings.

  Internally, Samba maintains time in traditional Unix format, namely,
  the number of seconds since 1970-01-01 00:00:00 Universal Time (or
  ``GMT''), not counting leap seconds.

  On the server side, Samba uses the Unix TZ variable to convert
  internal timestamps to and from local time.  So on the server side,
  there are two things to get right.

  1.  The Unix system clock must have the correct Universal time.  Use
  the shell command "sh -c 'TZ=UTC0 date'" to check this.

  2.  The TZ environment variable must be set on the server before Samba
  is invoked.  The details of this depend on the server OS, but
  typically you must edit a file whose name is /etc/TIMEZONE or
  /etc/default/init, or run the command `zic -l'.

  3.  TZ must have the correct value.

  3a.  If possible, use geographical time zone settings (e.g.
  TZ='America/Los_Angeles' or perhaps TZ=':US/Pacific').  These are
  supported by most popular Unix OSes, are easier to get right, and are
  more accurate for historical timestamps.  If your operating system has
  out-of-date tables, you should be able to update them from the public
  domain time zone tables at URL:ftp://elsie.nci.nih.gov/pub/.

  3b.  If your system does not support geographical time zone settings,
  you must use a Posix-style TZ strings, e.g.
  TZ='PST8PDT,M4.1.0/2,M10.5.0/2' for US Pacific time.  Posix TZ strings
  can take the following form (with optional items in brackets):

  StdOffsetDst[Offset,Date/Time,Date/Time]

  where:

  `Std' is the standard time designation (e.g. `PST').

  `Offset' is the number of hours behind UTC (e.g. `8').  Prepend a `-'
  if you are ahead of UTC, and append `:30' if you are at a half-hour
  offset.  Omit all the remaining items if you do not use daylight-
  saving time.

  `Dst' is the daylight-saving time designation (e.g. `PDT').

  The optional second `Offset' is the number of hours that daylight-
  saving time is behind UTC.  The default is 1 hour ahead of standard
  time.
  `Date/Time,Date/Time' specify when daylight-saving time starts and
  ends.  The format for a date is `Mm.n.d', which specifies the dth day
  (0 is Sunday) of the nth week of the mth month, where week 5 means the
  last such day in the month.  The format for a time is hh:mm[:ss],
  using a 24-hour clock.

  Other Posix string formats are allowed but you don't want to know
  about them.

  On the client side, you must make sure that your client's clock and
  time zone is also set appropriately.  [I don't know how to do this.]
  Samba traditionally has had many problems dealing with time zones, due
  to the bizarre ways that Microsoft network protocols handle time
  zones.  A common symptom is for file timestamps to be off by an hour.
  To work around the problem, try disconnecting from your Samba server
  and then reconnecting to it; or upgrade your Samba server to
  1.9.16alpha10 or later.

  3.7.  How do I set the printer driver name correctly?

  Question: > On NT, I opened "Printer Manager" and "Connect to
  Printer".  > Enter "\ptdi270s1"
  in the box of printer. I got the > following error message: > >
  You do not have sufficient access to your machine >     to connect to
  the selected printer, since a driver >     needs to be installed
  locally.

  Answer:

  In the more recent versions of Samba you can now set the "printer
  driver" in smb.conf. This tells the client what driver to use. For
  example, I have:

  printer driver = HP LaserJet 4L

  and NT knows to use the right driver. You have to get this string
  exactly right.

  To find the exact string to use, you need to get to the dialog box in
  your client where you select which printer driver to install. The
  correct strings for all the different printers are shown in a listbox
  in that dialog box.

  You could also try setting the driver to NULL like this:

  printer driver = NULL

  this is effectively what older versions of Samba did, so if that
  worked for you then give it a go. If this does work then let me know
  and I'll make it the default. Currently the default is a 0 length
  string.

  4.  Specific client application problems

  4.1.  MS Office Setup reports "Cannot change properties of "MSOF-
  FICEUP.INI"

  When installing MS Office on a Samba drive for which you have admin
  user permissions, ie. admin users = username, you will find the setup
  program unable to complete the installation.

  To get around this problem, do the installation without admin user
  permissions The problem is that MS Office Setup checks that a file is
  rdonly by trying to open it for writing.

  Admin users can always open a file for writing, as they run as root.
  You just have to install as a non-admin user and then use "chown -R"
  to fix the owner.

  5.  Miscellaneous