[Wolves] Network problems

[Andy Wootton]

Chris Ball wrote:

> Mark Ellse wrote:
>  > Obviously the master browser has gone down in some way. Is it telling
>
>> the network that it is doing the job, but not actually doing so? Is 
>> there any easy way on a network of thirty machines of finding which 
>> is the master browser?
>>
>> Any advice would be appreciated?
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Mark
>
>
> Hi Mark,
>
> AFAIK the setting for master browser is automatic in Windows systems 
> (or it was when I dealt with 9x workgroups) therefore the best thing 
> to do, would be to choose one machine in the workgroup (possibly the 
> one with the 0.1 ip address) and change it to the master browser, then 
> disable this on the rest.

The potential masters put themselves forward for election then 
everything automagically  elects one. If it dies then after some timeout 
period they are supposed to elect a new leader. Unfortunately, 
circumstancial evidence suggests that the protocol only works properly 
when you run it on Samba.

>
> To disable the master browser in windows XP follow these steps
> ...

But there will never be any automatic failover, even if it might have 
worked occasionally. I'd have at least two and make sure everyone who 
might ever use the room knows which they are. They should preferably be 
the ones that you would naturally switch on first and off last.

Put Samba on at least one of your boxes even if you don't use it. It has 
much better diagnostics about who  the other nodes currently think is in 
charge. This should at least reduce the number of PCs you have to reboot 
to get everything working properly.

Don't let the Samba config files intimidate you. It is easy if you stick 
to the basics. I think I changed about 4 lines.

Woo