> Okay, folks -- we've found the cause of the problem. > > To recap: With our Samba server as the master browser, the domain window > in My Network Places is totally empty, irrespective of what client we > use (Windows 98, 2000, XP). > > When Samba is not the master browser (i.e., another workstation is > acting as the master browser), hosts are visible. > > When Samba is the master browser, the browse.dat and wins.dat files are > populated correctly with the hosts on the network. > > Our browse.dat and wins.dat files are stored in /var/cache/samba. > > The directory had permissions of 744. With the permission set as 744, no > worky. With the permissions set at 755, tada -- suddenly it works. A > whole host of problems are resolved. A permissions problem (what we > initially suspected) but not one that was simple to devine. The browse > connections are made by an unprivileged user, and with permissions of > 744, that user cannot enter the directory, even if the files are readable. > > This is the sort of problem that a perusal of the nmbd log should have > made immediately obvious. If Samba can't read a vital file, shouldn't it > be reporting that in the logs? We've reproduced the problem with the log > level set at 9; though nmbd reports that the browse.dat file is being > written to, it never says anything about being unable to read it or > unable to enter the cache directory. If it had, we would have taken > three minutes to fix this problem instead of three weeks. > > We didn't see an error to this effect in the session logs, either. > > Perhaps there's something misconfigured with our logging -- but it seems > just as likely that Samba isn't reporting a failure to read the > browse.dat and wins.dat files to the logs. > > -Stephen-
stephen, i'm glad you found the answer. i'm afraid i wasn't much help at all now. -anthony -- To unsubscribe from this list go to the following URL and read the instructions: https://lists.samba.org/mailman/listinfo/samba
