- Understanding Open Directory
- What About Older Macs Running Mac OS 9?
- Replication: What to Do When One Server Isnt Enough
- Keeping Passwords and Your Infrastructure Safe and Secure
- The Basics of Setting Up an Open Directory Server
- Getting Practical About Open Directory and User Accounts
- Users in Workgroup Manager: The Mac OS X Server Tool for Account Management
What About Older Macs Running Mac OS 9?
Directory services, as they exist today, were not a central part of the classic Mac OS versions. Mac OS 9 includes a Multiple Users feature that allows you to create multiple user accounts on a single computer, but it essentially only establishes separate home folders for each user; it doesn’t create a true directory domain. Mac Manager, running on a Mac OS X Server, does create a level of interaction between Mac OS 9 and Open Directory, however. Of itself, Mac Manager does not contain any user or group information. These entries need to be created in a shared directory domain and then imported into Mac Manager (which simply passes all user ID or group ID requests to Open Directory). Mac Manager then interfaces with Mac OS 9 computers, allowing them to support login for users with accounts in a shared domain. It can also be used to create managed preferences workgroups that affect only Mac OS 9 computers, and that are controlled by Mac Manager itself and are not part of Open Directory. Essentially, Mac Manager is essentially a bridge between the Mac OS 9 Multiple Users feature and the data stored in Open Directory.