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mrgaskell · Mar 22, 2005, 10:19 AM

I have a friend who is wanting to switch to Macs and has a set-up in mind. He would like to have a monitor or even a Mac in three or four rooms but wants to be able and login from any room and work. Is there a way to have your home folder stored on a central server and logged into on any machine?

I was thinking you could store the folder on a a networked drive, use that hack in MacAddict to store your Home folder on your iPOd, but instead do it for the networked disk. Set up one machine to access the network to find that particular Home folder then clone it to the other machines.

He would have an Imac G5 in the office and Mac minis in all the other rooms.

Could this work or is there an easier solution?

larkost · Mar 22, 2005, 11:03 AM

MacOS X Server has this, and I think it can technically be setup using NetInfo, but doing this is going to be non-trivial. A far better approach would be to simply setup the computers (or more accurately the user) to all automatically mount a shared directory from a single computer, and keep your data there. The periodically rsync the home directories (or the Preferences) so that things get the same preferences.

As for mail, make sure you are using IMAP and this is not an issue.

Detrius · Mar 22, 2005, 06:40 PM

Originally posted by larkost:
...As for mail, make sure you are using IMAP and this is not an issue.

I FAR prefer the option of POP, while leaving the messages on the server for a week (or a month, depending on the user). This way, you don't worry about your ISP complaining about your mailbox being full.

larkost · Mar 22, 2005, 06:51 PM

Just setup your own IMAP server. It is trivial, you just have to have a server box and fetchmail. My choice is courier-mta, but I am not sure i compiles on MacOS X yet... that is what FreeBSD is for.

Moose · Mar 22, 2005, 07:29 PM

Originally posted by Detrius:
I FAR prefer the option of POP, while leaving the messages on the server for a week (or a month, depending on the user). This way, you don't worry about your ISP complaining about your mailbox being full.

POP with mail stored on the server is like Classic.

It'll work--sometimes, but it's fraught with problems.

If you use more than one computer to check your e-mail and you have the option of IMAP and POP, use IMAP.

Even if you don't, chances are the machine your mail's stored on gets backed up more than you back up your home directory, judging from the number of OH CRAP MY DATA IS GONE HOW 2 FIX ??? threads.

Detrius · Mar 22, 2005, 07:31 PM

Originally posted by larkost:
Just setup your own IMAP server. It is trivial, you just have to have a server box and fetchmail. My choice is courier-mta, but I am not sure i compiles on MacOS X yet... that is what FreeBSD is for.

I have done that, but that's not always appropriate for clients. Besides, I like my mac.com e-mail address. Who wants to have to try to remember a @something.dyndns.org e-mail address?

Moose · Mar 22, 2005, 07:53 PM

Originally posted by Detrius:
Besides, I like my mac.com e-mail address. Who wants to have to try to remember a @something.dyndns.org e-mail address?

Uh. You don't have to, Cap'n.

My e-mail address doesn't match the username and host I use to retrieve my mail.

Adding an intermediate step in the mail receipt process and changing the e-mail address at which you receive mail (and from which you generate it) are two tasks that are not necessarily related.

Let's say your home computer is home.dyndns.org with your account named fred. Let's also say that your ISP's mail server is pop.retardedispwithoutimap.com and your user is bongo73. On home.dyndns.org, you set up fetchmail to get your mail (bongo73@pop.retardedispwithoutimap.com) and it spools locally there (fred@homedyndns.org). home.dyndns.org also runs an IMAP server (with SSL, of course), because the admin (you) actually has a clue. Then, on whatever computers you get your mail, you set them to check home.dyndns.org, with username fred.

Bingo. You have mail. From any IMAP client. You still generate e-mail as bongo73@retardedispwithoutimap.com. You still receive it there. Adding webmail for fun and profit is simple as well.

While this is, as you say, outside the scope of many users (especially those who need to hire a Macintosh consultant who does not himself understand fully how e-mail works), it is possible, and many people do it.

romeosc · Mar 22, 2005, 07:54 PM

Originally posted by Detrius:
I FAR prefer the option of POP, while leaving the messages on the server for a week (or a month, depending on the user). This way, you don't worry about your ISP complaining about your mailbox being full.

Use Gmail or Spymac ...... 1GB free email storage online!

larkost · Mar 22, 2005, 07:55 PM

Originally posted by Detrius:
I have done that, but that's not always appropriate for clients. Besides, I like my mac.com e-mail address. Who wants to have to try to remember a @something.dyndns.org e-mail address?

Ya.... hence the fetchmail reference. And you always want to have a non-dynamic address for your outgoing mail server. Too many of the big boys are now refusing smtp that they can't reverse-dns.

And using POP from multiple computers is just so annoying. Even in the best of circumstances you have to delete or file things in multiple places.