Question about integrating Macs into Windows network.

[InlineFive]

Hi everyone,

A few of our Marketing people would like to have their new computers be Macs instead of Windows PCs. This is fine with me but unfortunately I don't have any experience with Mac in a Windows environment.

Currently we are using a workgroup network but will be migrating to Active Directory within a year or two. From what I understand the latest iteration of Mac OS X Active has good Active Directory integration so my questions pertain to Workgroup networking.

How easy is it to browse a network in Mac OS X? It is similiar to Windows where you can view a list of computers and click on one to access it's shares?

From the other direction, how hard is it to browse to the Mac from a Windows machine? I've used OS 10.2 and you had to type in an IP address to gain access. If this is still the case I don't think this will work.

Is there a way to store network access credentials, similiar to Network Passwords in Windows XP? The passwords for these accounts are rather complex and I'd rather the end-user not see them.

Anything else I should be aware of?

Thanks for your time!

I5

 

[gwag]

if you run a local DNS server you should be able to browse fine or at least using machine names. you can auto mount server and store passwords. do you have areal windows server? if so you should be fine. basically anything you can do in UNIX you can do in X as far as networking goes. if your windows server domain use a .local there can be issues but I think its fixed in 10.3 on.... it will be a little headache if you have a lot of different servers. once you switch to AD your rather complex passwords will go out the window....

 

[chcarnage]

Thanks for you openmindedness, I've not much experience in mixed networks so I'll skip right to the bottom:

Originally posted by: InlineFive
How easy is it to browse a network in Mac OS X? It is similiar to Windows where you can view a list of computers and click on one to access it's shares?

From the other direction, how hard is it to browse to the Mac from a Windows machine? I've used OS 10.2 and you had to type in an IP address to gain access. If this is still the case I don't think this will work.

Yes it is similar, speaking from the GUI perspective.

It is still possible to access the user folder of a properly configured Mac by typing computersIP\Username in an Explorer window but you'll likely use another method in a professional situation. I occasionally connect my Macs with PCs, sometimes Windows immediately detected the Mac in the network window, sometimes not (but I don't know the Windows machines I've connected to good enough to say why it sometimes works and sometimes typing the IP was necessary).

Is there a way to store network access credentials, similiar to Network Passwords in Windows XP? The passwords for these accounts are rather complex and I'd rather the end-user not see them.

OS X comes with a password utility called Apple Keychain which is used to store login information to other Macs in networks but I don't know if it is useful for connecting to PCs.

Anything else I should be aware of?

OS X's network behavior changed noticeably in the past so clarify right from the beginning that you support no older versions than 10.4.

If Mac clients write files named .DS_Store in the directories they visit, you can change this habit with the freeware TinkerTool. This is OS X metadata for the arrangement of icons in a folder and other things and the files are invisible to OS X computers.

 

[InlineFive]

Thanks for the help guys. 🙂 I think I'll scoop up an old iMac to experiment with.

 

[RebateMonger]

Eriq Neale's book on SBS 2003 has a forty-page chapter on integrating Macintoshes into Windows Server 2003 networks. There may be better references....I don't know....but Eriq seems to cover most of the bases - Shares, AD, Exchange, SMB, Secure Website Access, and Remote Access.

Edit:
One real pain is that Macintosh users won't get the "Your Password is about to Expire" message. All of a sudden, they can't log on and the users keep calling to ask why.

I'd read that this problem had been fixed by some very recent patch of Mac software...presumably the very latest update of OSX, but I don't recall for sure.

Also, at least some versions of the Mac won't allow passwords longer than 10 characters. That sucks, since I prefer to set a 14 character minimum on my SBS 2003 networks.

Microsoft Technet article on Macs in Windows Network.