[Waterman]

Hi. I'm trying to set up an Xserve to host users' directories so that at the login screen they can type in their user names and go (ie, I don't want to have them do a cmd-k and connect like that).

Basically, here's the current status and problem: at the client computer, I log in using a user name that I configured from the Xserve. I have the client machine statically bound to the Xserve, so that it looks in the NetInfo database that is shared there. It is able to authenticate the user and log in, but it can't find the user's home directory. It comes up with an error message saying that the "home" directory was not found in the usual place.

Do I have to turn on some kind of automounting here to mount the user's volume or am I barking up the wrong tree?

I would be indebted to anyone who could assist. This is really my first exposure to an OS X admin situation. I feel like I'm close, and yet there must be one more hurdle to surmount. Thanks in advance!

[Waterman]

You are an idiot, waterman.

It's like this... there were two entries in the /mounts directories in NetInfo. This was intriguing because when I logged in to the client machine using a user name stored in its local netinfo database, I noticed a few aliases in the /Networks folder that were dead ends (they were aliases to items that could not be found). So, I capriciously deleted the two entries in the /mounts folder and restarted the Xserve. Also the automount settings in Server Admin were not sticking. That is, I would set the Users volume to automount dynamically in /Network/Servers, and then, upon closing and opening the same window, the check box would be unchecked as though I had never checked it.

Curious.

So, on a whim, I decided I'd keep that window open, restart the client machine and see if it took. Maybe just leaving the window open a little longer got it to stick, or maybe this was a case similar to Mr. Burns' diseases being in perfect balance, but whatever the case was, it worked.

Now, I can log in from the client machine (933 G4) and from my PowerBook (Pismo). But, methinks they have changed the login process under 10.2 because the computers that we have running that system can not find the home directory.

We'll just have to wait til our 10.2 server arrives.