OS X Server: users can not connect to SMB or AFP shares

We have been troubleshooting several reports from offices with bound OS X servers where Mac and PC clients are unable to connect to shares using AFP or SMB.  Additionally these offices have reported that Macs will randomly drop their AFP connections to the OS X server.

When the connection problem occurs often times the server shares will display generic ACL GUIDs: a series of numbers and letters instead of the group name.   In cases such as these restarting Directory Services generally resolves the problem- at least temporarily:

sudo /usr/bin/killall DirectoryService

Other times the GUIDs display normally but the connection problems still persist.  In these cases two things are suggested:

1. Nest AD users into local groups and then use the local groups to populate the ACLs
2. Flush the group membership cache by running this command:  

sudo dsmemberutil flushcache

Generally these problems occur most often on Leopard servers- Snow Leopard servers have improved group membership caching.

Mac administrator account changing to a standard account

We have had several reports of Macs that have their admin account changed to a standard account.

The fix is to login to the machine as root, go to "Accounts", select the admin account and put a tick in "allow user to administer this computer".

If the root account is disabled or you do not know the password you will have to boot the machine from the OS DVD and enable the account/reset the root password.

Full instructions can be found here:

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1278

Shaking Login: corrupt Kerberos file

Apple has informed us that sometimes anti-virus software can corrupt the kerberos files found in:

/var/db/dslocal/nodes/Default/config/

They suggest that a trouble shooting step for a shaking login should be to remove all the Kerberos files in the above directory.

sudo /var/db/dslocal/nodes/Default/config/
rm Kerberos*

then restart.

Outlook 2011 Profiles Disappearing

There have been some reports that when a user launches Outlook their profile is no longer there.  It seems to have something to do with the database daemon thinking the user's database has vanished.


Here is one reported work-around:

• Keep Outlook open
• Go to Terminal
• Type, ps aux | grep Microsoft
• Look for the MS Office 2011 processes
• Note the number after the user name- this is the Process ID (PID)
• In Terminal type, sudo kill –9 [PID number]
• Do this for each of the Microsoft processes
• Re-launch Outlook