NFS client = Linux, NFS server = Mac OS X Tiger --> Hell of a problem
 

I have a Mac Mini with OS X Tiger running as a NFS fileserver in a Linux-network, it has a 500 GB external FireWire-hard disk for storage space. This external disk has no affection to my problem, btw. Also tried sharing files from the internal hard drive.

Anyways, things work pretty well, I used NFS Manager to make the shares on the Mac-side and Linux-clients find automount-points from the LDAP-server and mount the shares.

The problem
While Linux mostly sees all the files on the shares mounted from the Mac, not ALL programs see files on the shares at all! For example JBuilder and lots of command-line copying programs think that there's no files at all (basic cp works, though)! I do NOT have this problem when I mount shares from a Linux-NFS server to a Mac, OR from Linux-NFS server to Linux.

This is a BIG problem, because with some programs (maybe 50/50 of the programs I use) I need to copy the files to the client computers first, before modifying, instead of accessing them directly from the network. Yes, KDE and Konqueror, also ls and such basic utilities see the files perfectly. This is what makes this problem so strange.

I've googled for this problem for days. What can cause it? I can't find any info.

Now, I know putting Linux PPC-port to the Mac would solve this problem (Linux-to-Linux NFS-mounts cause no trouble, ever)... but if there's a faster solution, I'm all ear. :)


My settings on the LDAP for each NFS-share:
...and the settings for NFS-shares on the OS X-side:

Check for any mount timeouts...
and programs dont see the files always or sometiems? and all programs dont see antyhing or some? if some then list them...

Those programs don't see any files - ever. Examples: all Java-programs, all Kylix-written programs and some others.

And then again, some programs always see all files without any problems.

ah, i just saw this word "automount" in your post.
Can you try mounting by /etc/fstab entries?
automount sometimes dont work the way it is expected to...

Tried that now too... same result.

:-(

Well, tried altering the Linux (client)-side options for the mounts. Had no effect whatsoever. Seems that I'm forced to erase OS X and put a PPC-Linux on the Mac Mini instead (no sense in keeping 2 OS on this computer).

.

NFS vers=2
 

Changing the NFS version to 2 (instead of the default 4) used on the client (Fedora3) fixed my (similar) issues.

in /etc/fstab

server:/Volumes/raid/username /raid_user nfs defaults,vers=2 0 0

instead of

server:/Volumes/raid/username /raid_user nfs defaults 0 0

And so did (finally) mine. Thank you a lot! Now it works!