The central file servers will have support for the SMB protocol added for user's home directories to be accessible from the Microsoft desktop using the Microsoft provided network clients. (Other venders also have products providing SMB protocol for the desktop.)

Currently there is one "Samba" server simba01.u.washington.edu which serves the Homer home directories. It is intended that each of NFS file servers will also become SMB servers. Since some of those servers do not have front door networks, other machines will fill the intermediary role in those cases.

A DNS enhancement will be made to resolve names of the form user.host.deskfile.washington.edu to the appropriate Samba server which can provide the user's home directory for the host.

A modification to Samba will be made to support validation of (user,password) pairs with Kerberos.

Special departmental accounts will be setup and the Samba server configured to provide "group" access to the account home directory. Kirk will handle that via special access for changing the Samba configuration file.