RE: GMC Network

["Fox, Kevin M" <kmfox bhi010 bhi-erc com>]

All good points. The only problem I see is with protable users.... Laptops.
They need the flexability to connect really fast, but cant be presetup
everytime it moves to a new network.
This could be handled through a libvfs add on thow.

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Gleef [SMTP:dzol@virtual-yellow.com]
> Sent:	Monday, December 28, 1998 10:34 AM
> To:	Fox, Kevin M
> Cc:	'gnome-list@gnome.org'
> Subject:	Re: GMC Network
> 
> 
> On Mon, 28 Dec 1998, Fox, Kevin M wrote:
> > I am on a Winsuck network. :(
> 
> I sympathize, I have to deal with one at work too.
> 
> 
> > If Gnome is to be a replacement to windows, GMC must provide a "Network
> > Neighborhood"
> 
> Well, it's a good thing that GNOME is not supposed to be a replacement to
> Windows.  GNOME is supposed to be a cross-platform desktop environment for
> the X Window System.  While many of us hope it is impressive enough to be
> another reason for people to abandon Windows, that is a side effect, not
> the goal.
> 
> Now, as far as a "Network Neighborhood" goes, that is a windowsism that I
> don't even see many windows users using.  Most of the users on the Windows
> networks I deal with find it very awkward.  Instead, we have hardcoded
> drive letters assigned to the sharepoints the people need, and they use
> the "Map Network Drive" (cf. mount) interface to access directories that
> aren't hardcoded.
> 
> Some people may find a network browsing application useful, but it
> needn't be glommed into GMC.  It would work better as a separate
> application.  Such a browser might support NIS+, SMB, NDS, LDAP, DAP, and
> so on, making it useful to more than just the Windows crowd.  It also
> could support mounting if the FS is supported by the kernel and the user
> is allowed to mount.
> 
> 
> > And it must support SMB. Samba would be a good thing to tie into GMC.
> 
> Unix and Windows have very different design philosophies.  Windows is
> designed to be a single-user low-security machine, so having mount
> features in the file manager is No Big Deal (TM).  Unix is designed to be
> a multi-user high-security machine.  Mount features in the file
> manager browser would either:
>     A) Not work most of the time, when users have no mount privileges
>  or B) Be a security hole due to the workaround to give the user mount
>        privileges
> 
> GMC can handle SMB directories just fine.  Root mounts the directory, GMC
> treats it as just another part of the file system.  GMC should not be
> actually connecting remote directories to mountpoints, whether they are
> SMB, NFS, Coda or foobarfs.
> 
> On the other hand, just like libvfs handles FTP servers as if it were
> directories, it would make sense (if someone wanted to write it) to add
> libvfs support for things like NFS and SMB shared directories.
> 
> 
> > Personally I hate SMB compared to NCP but I cant do anything about that
> at
> > work.
> 
> Ideally, GNOME will support all such filesystems, but you can't blame the
> developers for focusing on what they find useful/interesting, rather than
> what you consider a requirement.
> 
> 
> > For the enterprises to use Gnome, they must be able to just point and
> click
> > there way through the network. Most business people don't know the names
> of
> > there servers... They can only remember it if they see it.
> 
> For an enterprise to use either GNOME or Windows effectivly, they
> need to have a support system.  Either they need a competant systems 
> administrator setting up things like sharepoints/mountpoints in a manner
> that supports the work being done, or they need adequate training in their
> local network topology.  Most businesspeople should not be left to wander
> aimlessly throughout their network structure just to get their job done.
> 
> GNOME is no substitute for poor systems administration.  If anything, it
> might make poor administration that much more obvious.
> 
> Best of Luck,
> -Gleef