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If you have ever set up a small Mac network, you know creating a
server is as easy as pie (see Transferring
Files from Your Old Mac to Your New One for more on this topic),
and it's a snap to setup login names and passwords using Users and
Groups. This function is called "Personal File Sharing" in the deep
Apple documentation, but as your needs grow you will soon hit the
"Wall of 10."
Apple designed personal file sharing for small work groups. To
encourage upgrades to AppleShare IP or Mac OS X Server, they
built in some limitations which money can alleviate.
Having no money, I had to create a workaround, and I thought
others might be interested.
In my classroom last year, nine Power Mac computers were connected
through the building's network to my server, a Quadra
700 decked out with 20 MB of RAM, an aging SyQuest 200 MB
cartridge drive, and an external 1 GB LaCie SCSI drive, which was the
workhorse drive of the system. (Aside: That squirrelly drive rattled
all last year, buzzed, and clicked, until I finally broke down and
opened the thing up and discovered it had a bad cooling fan - which
I replaced, solving the problem. If the thing is out of warranty, go
ahead and open it up! You'd be surprised what you can fix.)
Anyway, with nine computers on the network I never really
encountered the "10 limit," so it wasn't until this fall, when I
obtained several brand spanking new iMacs for the classroom, that I
had to face reality: Everyone couldn't automatically be logged into
the server simultaneously any more.
What is the "10 limit"? Built into Apple's file sharing system are
the following limits:
No more than 10 folders can be "share points" at one time. A
"share point" is a folder or drive volume which appears on the
network as a device you can connect to remotely. You can share
many more than 10 folders within a single share point, but
they cannot be logged into separately. So if you wanted to have a
folder for every user, secure from other users' eyes, 10 is your
limit.
No more than 10 users can be connected simultaneously.
No more than 100 users can be listed in your Users and Groups
file. (Most teachers, at least in high school, have well over 100
students. I have 170 or so.)
Apple
Knowledge Base Article 15460 describes these limits and compares
the limits set for AppleShare IP. (I'm still not used to saying
"Knowledge Base" instead of "TIL".) Most of the numbers go up if you
use AppleShare IP. Licenses of various sizes are available. Normal
humans can buy a 10-user license, a 500-user license, and an
"unlimited" license. Educators can buy a 50 user license, but this is
exactly the wrong size: too large for a single classroom, but too
small for a department.
Given these limitations and 14 computers, I can no longer allow
everyone to connect to the server and just sit there for 100 minutes,
always connected. So here is how I am working around the limit.
I created a shared folder for each of my classes, using up 6
of the available 10 slots. This eliminates the problem of having
individual logins, but it does mean that students will have to be
better trained to avoid throwing away other people's work. A
seventh shared folder is called "Today's Assignment" and contains
URLs or settings files for the project in use that day.
I also created a user for each class period, such as "First
period student" and assigned a password. This effectively avoids
the 100-user limit as am using only nine users (six classes, my
assistant, myself, and the tech.)
I made an alias of the shared folder while connected via a
student machine, then copied the alias to all the other student
machines. Double-clicking on the alias eliminates the "Chooser"
and "AppleShare" and "zone" steps of logging in manually.
Students will be trained to log in via the alias when
necessary, but also to disconnect once the files are moved to the
local machine. Since only 10 can be connected simultaneously,
they'll just have to take turns.
An alternative suggested to me was running two servers
simultaneously. That might work, but it does prohibit the use of the
"Today's Assignment" folder unless I struggle to keep both folders
synchronized. It also takes up an ethernet port I'd rather use on a
student machine.
This fall we will begin using the iBook cart labs Apple is so fond
of advertising. Our carts will have 15 or so iBooks on each cart plus
a base station and an iMac. Without floppy drives on the iBooks and
iMacs, Apple should remove the 10-user limit - or at least extend it
to 20 or 30 machines - so districts can work around the lack of a
floppy, which always causes trouble with the PC people and the people
who purchase the hardware. Yes, they can all surf, even through a
single base station if necessary, but they can't save their work
anywhere without cumbersome unnecessary steps which could be
eliminated by having a server able to handle a classroom of machines
without extra expense. You might argue that an AppleShare IP license
is small change compared to all those nice iBooks, but the conditions
of our tech grant require us to spend nearly every available penny on
putting machines in classrooms; there's nothing left for such
niceties as server software (or floppy drives, for that matter).
When the iBook carts are ready, I'll let you know how it works
out.
Jeff Adkins is a science teacher who isn't afraid to state his preferences in computing platforms. In his classroom he has everything from a beige All-in-One to a a G4 XServe, and they all work together nicely. He calls himself the "poster child for technology integration" in the classroom. He was the 2006 Outstanding Educator of the Year for the California Computer Using Educators (CUE) organization. He also maintains a site for astronomy teachers at www.AstronomyTeacher.com.
Mac of the Day: iMac Core2, Sep. 2006 - Apple introduced the biggest screen ever in an iMac with a 24" Core2 Duo model at 2.16 GHz.
List of the Day: MacBook List for those using a MacBook or MacBook Pro.
September 6 in LEM history: 99: G4 vs. Pentium III - 00: Setting up a server - 02: Norton Utilities warning - 10 greatest computer annoyances - 06: iMac Core2 Duo - Mac mini Core Duo - The iMac Core2 value equation - 07: Apple seduction - Why I really want an iPod touch - iPod history, 2005 to present - Upgrading a Power Mac G - Apple intros iPod touch, classic, and video nano
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