[Samba] Is it my networking?

[James Kreuziger]

I've used samba for the better part of 4 years now.
Never had any real problems that were not easily
resolved.  Samba has become the single most important
piece of software in our lab. It has reduced my
administrative headaches considerably.

However, now I have a real problem that I have no clue
on.  I'm running a Samba 2.2.8a PDC on Sun Solaris.  About
2 months ago, we moved our lab from a location at
the Med Center to the main University campus.  This
included completely changing our network.  We updated
all of our network parameters (IP, netmask, etc)
on all of our UNIX and Windows boxes.  The names didn't
change, only the domains and the IP's.  I made the
appropriate changes in my smb.conf file for the new
IP's and netmask.

Now the problem.  I have VERY intermittent connectivity
to my PDC.  When I show up in the morning, I can't log in
more than half the time because it tells me the
"domain is unavailable".  Sometimes stopping and restarting
samba does the trick; sometimes it makes it worse.  When it's
not working, I'll login to the machine running samba and run the
following command:

nmblookup -M MYDOM

and it doesn't show an MYDOM<1d> entry.  It just can't find anything.
When I log in as a local user on my Win2K box, and run the following
command:

nbtstat -M samba_server

sometimes it connects and give me the proper info, sometimes not.
Browsing is also screwed up.  When I go into Windows Explorer, it takes
30 seconds for it to update all my mapped drives.

The most frustrating thing(s) about all of this is that it is
intermitant, and that samba worked PERFECTLY before the move.
The only changes I made were the networking parameters.  I've
looked through my logs, but don't see anything weird.  I'm at
the point where I don't know what to do.  I'm thinking that my
network segment is all f^%$*(@ up, but since I don't control the
routers and switches, I can't make changes there.  Where do I start?
I've probably tried alot of my own ideas already, but I'm open to
listen to anybody right now.  I'm sure you all have a good idea
where to start.

I'll post the global section of my smb.conf file below.  I've
changed the actual IP's, but they reflect how my network is configured.

Please email me directly if you would like.

Thanks,

-Jim

*************************************************
Jim Kreuziger
jkreuzig at uci.edu
*************************************************

# Global parameters
[global]
        workgroup = MYLAB
        preexec = csh -c `echo /usr/local/samba/bin/smbclient \
                                -M %m -I %I` &
        server string = Samba %v on (%L)
        security = user
        domain logons = yes
        domain admin group = @domadm
        encrypt passwords = Yes
        password level = 3
        log level = 2
        log file = /samba/current/var/log.smbd.%m
        #log file = /samba/current/var/log.smbd.nodomain
        max log size = 2000
        wins support = Yes
        name resolve order = lmhosts wins hosts bcast
        dns proxy = yes
        deadtime = 0
        keepalive = 3600
        client code page = 437
        domain master = yes
        preferred master = yes
        local master = yes
        os level = 255
        guest account = samba
        invalid users = daemon bin sys lp smtp uucp nuucp listen dcs consult dumper nobody
        hosts allow = 10.200.236.32/255.255.255.224 10.87.33. 10.200.126. 127.0.0.1
        hosts deny = ALL EXCEPT 10.200.236.32/255.255.255.224 10.87.33. 10.200.126. 127.0.0.1
        veto oplock files = /*.mdb/*.dbm/*.doc/*.xls
        socket options = TCP_NODELAY IPTOS_LOWDELAY
        getwd cache = yes
        logon script = %U.bat
        logon path = \\samba_server\profile\%U
        utmp = True
        username map = /samba/current/lib/usermap.txt