Know what's offered and what's missing in MPE/iX 6.0
for file sharing — and where to get important updates

By Michael Gueterman
Easy Does It Technologies

Samba/iX is a freeware product originally created by Andrew Tridgell and now maintained by a group of people collectively called “The Samba Team.” It was first built to mount a workspace on Tridgell’s Sun workstation from his MS-DOS PC. In December 1995, Lars Appel of Hewlett-Packard’s German Response Center began to port the then-current version of Samba to MPE/iX. The outcome of that port has since been called “Samba/iX,” and will become a supported part of the MPE/iX FOS as of version 6.0, which HP ships this month to all 3000 sites on support.

There have been several articles already written on what Samba/iX is and what it can do for you. I want to let you know what has happened to Samba since the time the original MPE/iX port was completed. Considering that approximately two years have elapsed between when that Samba version 1.9.16p9 was officially released — and when HP will start distributing and supporting that version — there have been a few significant changes to the base package.

Samba Version Numbers

First let me quickly explain the meaning behind the Samba version numbering scheme. The digits separated by periods define the major level, while anything to the right of the major level (i.e., anything immediately following the last number prefixed by a period) is considered a minor or “fix” level. Minor levels come in two flavors, “alpha” (or pre-releases), and “stable” (or production releases). Alpha releases predate the release of a major version (ex. 1.9.17alpha1 comes before 1.9.17alpha5, which comes before 1.9.17).

Once an alpha release has been sufficiently tested, it becomes a stable release. Inevitably, bugs are located, and as they are eradicated, various production versions are released (1.9.17p1 follows 1.9.17, 1.9.17p2 comes after 1.9.17p1, etc). At some point, work on the next major release is begun, and the cycles briefly overlap (the 1.9.17 alpha series was being worked on as the 1.9.16p# series was being released).

Generally speaking, major new functionality is only introduced as a new major version. However, as you’ll see in the following paragraphs, the minor versions can sometimes become very substantial in their own right.

Samba’s Recent Past

In late September, the current stable release of Samba was 1.9.18p10. Alpha releases of Samba 2.0 are also available (a 1.9.19 version had originally been planned, but the functionality being added for the next major release is so substantial that a jump to 2.0 seemed more appropriate).

Red denotes major functionality releases after the Samba/iX on MPE/iX 6.0

Date	Event
August 22, 1996	Samba 1.9.16 Released
August 22, 1996	Samba 1.9.16p1 Released
August 24, 1996	Samba 1.9.16p2 Released
October 24, 1996	Samba 1.9.16p9 Released
December 1996	Samba/iX .7 Released by Lars Appel (Samba 1.9.16p9)
January 31, 1997	Samba 1.9.16p10 Released
February 22, 1997	Samba 1.9.16p11 Released (last minor release of 1.9.16)
May 20, 1997	Samba/iX ..7b/.7c Released by Lars Appel (bug fix of .7)
August 26, 1997	1.9.17 Released
September 5, 1997	1.9.17p1 Released
September 27, 1997	1.9.17p2 Released
October 14, 1997	1.9.17p3 Released
October 21, 1997	1.9.17p4 Released
December 20, 1997	1.9.17p5 Released (last minor release of 1.9.17)
January 7, 1998	1.9.18 Released
January 12, 1998	1.9.18p1 Released
January 26, 1998	1.9.18p2 Released
February 10, 1998	Samba/iX .8 Alpha Released for testing by Lars Appel (Samba 1.9.16p9)
February 18, 1998	1.9.18p3 Released
March 27, 1998	1.9.18p4 Released
May 8, 1998	1.9.18p5 Released
May 11, 1998	1.9.18p6 Released
May 12, 1998	1.9.18p7 Released
June 12, 1998	1.9.18p8 Released
August 26, 1998	1.9.18p10 Released (last anticipated release of 1.9.18)

As you can see by looking at the table, there have been a total of 18 stable releases (and untold alpha releases) since the 1.9.16p9 version was released. During this same period of time, Microsoft has released multiple service packs for Windows 95 and Windows NT 4.0, as well as the successor to Windows 95, Windows 98. If you’re a Microsoft Windows user (and most of you who either have or are contemplating installing Samba/iX are, since the SMB protocol that Samba uses is the native network file and printer sharing protocol for Microsoft operating systems) this affects you greatly.

When 1.9.16p9 was originally released, the default authentication method employed by the Microsoft operating systems was a form of clear-text password passing. However, the default has been changed since then to an encrypted password/token passing authentication. This is an authentication that the older versions of Samba (including 1.9.16p9, or Samba/iX) cannot handle without being compiled with a special library, one that fell under US export restrictions.

Luckily, there is an entry that you can make to the registry of PCs which re-enables the clear text authentication scheme as the default. (See the Additional Resources section at the end of this article to find out where to get the entry.) Without this registry hack, you would be unable to utilize any password-protected Samba/iX resources. Samba itself has kept up with Microsoft — so as of the 1.9.18 version, encrypted passwords are supported without special libraries, so there’s no US export restrictions.

Major Functionality Enhancements Since 1.9.16p9

There are far too many enhancements and bug fixes to the Samba product that have been made over the past two years to list here (a full list compiled from the various Samba releases is available at the www.sambaix.com web site).

A few of the major enhancements not included as part of the Samba/iX bundled in MPE/iX 6.0 include:

• 1.9.16p10 — Samba can act as a domain master browser.

• 1.9.16p11 — Several Windows 95 and NT compatibility issues resolved.

• 1.9.17 — Improved browsing support, Improved share mode handling, roving profile support

• 1.9.18 — Support for ‘Opportunistic Locking’ added (with this addition, Samba has been benchmarked as out-performing Windows NT on equivalently-priced hardware). Addition of client ‘code page’ support. New printing support, support for encrypted passwords without using the ‘libdes’ library.

• 1.9.18p4 — Name resolution order now user selectable - Printer share names can be up to 15 characters in length. Password changing supported (would not apply on MPE/iX).

• 1.9.18p10 — Addition of the new ‘strict sync’ parameter to bypass a problem with the Windows 98 Explorer which caused major performance problems. Added several new options to control the “pausing” of print queues.

The Future for Samba/iX

Hewlett-Packard is missing these enhancements in releasing Samba 1.9.16p9 to their customers with MPE/iX 6.0. It is anticipated that a more current version will shortly be made available in order to try and catch up with the changes currently being made at Internet Speed. However, it is unlikely to expect HP will ever distribute and support Samba/iX at parity with the versions released by the Samba Team.

With that in mind, a new effort has been established to bring Samba/iX up to the current revision, as well as integrate the MPE/iX-specific logic back into the base version maintained by the Samba Team. Those efforts are still underway. With the support of the Samba Team it is expected that parity will be achieved with the first stable release of Samba 2.0 — tentatively scheduled for late 1998. Several MPE/iX-specific additions are being planned for inclusion into the product, such as support for the third-party security products SAFE/3000 from Monterey Software Group, and Security/3000 from Vesoft. A schedule for releasing these additions hasn’t been determined.

Additional Resources

A web site devoted to Samba/iX (www.sambaix.com) has been established with the intent of providing MPE/iX users with a one-stop place to go for all of their Samba/iX questions and needs. In addition to the most current versions of Samba/iX, you will also find a wide range of documentation, sample configurations, links to additional Samba sites of interest, and an interactive discussion area devoted to all things Samba. A Samba/iX version of 1.9.18p10 is anticipated to become available at that web site in the same timeframe as the release of MPE/iX 6.0.

Michael Gueterman is founder of Easy Does It Technologies, an HP 3000 Technical Consulting and WWW services company.