Okay, lots of info there, hehe. First of all, the only line in my smb.conf that you mentioned is:

wins support = yes

I have WINS working now, for sure, though. I verified this by using nbtstat -r on my XP box and saw that all the name registrations and resolutions were via name server.

As far as the router goes, I would really prefer to keep the WINS setting in the DHCP server on the router so that when friends come over to network they will automatically get the WINS IP if they are set up for DHCP. However, if you think WINS is somehow causing the master browser problem (cuz WINS itself is working just fine now), I'll change that.

Currently the only issue is that when the linux box is the master browser, Network Neighborhood does not work. That's the only problem left to solve.

OK I was confused on that then, I thought you meant you told the router that it should use the wins server for it's settings, but it's ok to tell it to give out the wins server info to DHCP clients

Did you take a coffee break and check back to see if it worked?

Yes, if the wins server is "working" but it's not doing "network neighborhood" then change it. This was asked way earlier but if the clients are set to use wins then they don't usually broadcast. If the samba server doesn't run 24/7 then I'd suggest not being a wins server, it's going to be master browser when it's up either way but when it's down the win boxes can just do their own thing and should work.

Once it's working, using samba as wins server (wins support = yes means samba is a wins server) or not you should be able to have friends come over and use DHCP to "Plug and Play" into your network.

If you don't have wins server= or wins proxy= lines that's fine, the defaults are what you want anyhow.

Verification:
your network looks like this?

XP------\
samba--router/DSL---{internet}
2k-------/

My home lan is set up something like this if it helps any:

server: samba wins server, dhcp server, modem to net, dhcp gives itself as netbios nameserver (wins server)
98/linux: dhcp client
nt/linux: dhcp client
xp: dhcp client

and is wired like this:

/---98/linux
/----XP
hub---server---modem---net
\---NT/Linux

And all of them show up in net neighborhood by the time they get to the desktop or login prompt.

Wow, very nice post. Thanks a bunch.

Yes, my network looks like the diagram you described (very nice use of plain text, btw)

I've given it a good 20 minutes to work before, so I'm sure that that's not the issue.

You said that if the WINS serveris working but Network Neighborhood doesn't work to ditch the WINS server. I was under the impression that WINS servers and master browsers were two totally separate things and that as long as NetBIOS names were resolving through the WINS server, it's doing its job. Are they actually related? If not, the only thing I need to fix is the linux master browser (which is online 24/7)

My plan is to have my home network look just like yours. I'm just doing it one step at a time. Here's my plan:

1) basic network shares and connectivity using Samba (done)
2) SSH (done)
3) WINS server (done, I think)
4) Master Browser (not in original plan, but currently next step)
5) DHCP
6) DNS server
7) Router (then network topology will resemble yours)
8) Web Server
9) E-Mail Server


Thanks a bunch for the help!!!

Here is an excerpt from my /var/log/messages file that might be of some use regarding the issues with the linux box being the master browser

Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: [2003/01/29 20:50:56, 0] nmbd/nmbd_become_lmb.c:become_local_master_stage2(404)
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: *****
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]:
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: Samba name server MAINSERVER is now a local master browser for workgroup ASH-CAN on subnet 192.168.1.2
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]:
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: *****
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: [2003/01/29 20:50:56, 0] nmbd/nmbd_browsesync.c:find_domain_master_name_query_fail(358)
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: find_domain_master_name_query_fail:
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: Unable to find the Domain Master Browser name ASH-CAN<1b> for the workgroup ASH-CAN.
Jan 29 20:50:56 localhost nmbd[922]: Unable to sync browse lists in this workgroup.


The "Unable to find the Domain Master Browser name ASH-CAN<1b> for the workgroup ASH-CAN." and "Unable to sync browse lists in this workgroup" message repeat several times before the next non-nmbd message.

Did I mention try turning off WINS?

The guys who work on the samba project realized that the whole master browser election thing kinda sucked so they tried to do what they could on their end and then made it possible for samba to take over all that since it does a better job (and any *nix machine with samba on it and even the mac port are far less likely to crash than the most stable win box.).

Did I mention try turning off WINS?

Which machine is "Samba name server MAINSERVER" since your smb.conf says " netbios name = Ash-Can Server". This may just be a voodoo thing but when I have trouble with it I fall back to old dos style (8+3) names for everything in netbios.

With wins if you miss one little thing or have the wins server down when a client boots everything can look broken. Without it samba will still do the same job it just does it in a different way .
I'd say wins is looking for the DMB which is actually a special job given to a PDC but you don't have samba set up as a PDC. And now that the little idiot light in my head went off, WINS server goes on domain controller so if you don't have a domain controller (or samba acting like 1) don't try to use wins (my samba acts like a PDC.)

If you want more of the scoop check out Samba-PDC-something and Samba-BDC... in the docs in samba's source tree.

Sorry, I forgot to mention that I changed the NetBIOS name in the smb.conf because I was getting sick of not being able to use console commands on any of my computers relating to "Ash-Can Server" because it had a space. So when MAINSERVER became the master browser, that was the linux box (and WINS server).

According to my cousin (who is an accomplished network consultant, but is also a Linux and Samba newb), you can have WINS on any computer. You don't have to have it on a PDC or BDC.

I've also found another strange anomoly on here: The WINS server can't resolve NetBIOS names using itself, but the other computers on the network CAN resolve through it. Any ideas on that one?

Okay, I made a mistake on my last post. I thought that the WINS server was not resolving NetBIOS names, but when I was trying to get it to, I was using ping.

Isn't it correct that ping will not resolve a NetBIOS name on a Linux server since it's not part of the Samba package? And it will on a Windows or NT computer because SMB and ultimately NetBIOS names are native to the OS?


Also, I'm still having the problem with the Linux server becoming the master browser. It just won't allow anyone to browse the network. Is there any way to:

A) force it to not be the master browser and make the NT computers force an election when they boot, or...

B) make it function correctly as a master browser?

Ack! My post is missing.

Yes, linux doesn't by default use wins for native commands such as ping.

Well I had a long winded explanation but basically wins with no PDC is bad. your cousin is right it doesn't have to be ON the PDC but it still expects to find A PDC somewhere on the network. Thus the error "find_domain_master_name_query_fail"

Rather than remember all the stuff I had typed in, check out these docs in the samba source tree:

Samba-PDC-HOWTO and Integrating-with-Windows

which hopefully answer your questions, it even explains how to get linux to use wins for native commands.

WINS is working. The local browse master is not (on the Linux box). I tried turning WINS off, and I still couldn't browse if the Linux server became the local browse master. These are two totally unrelated issue, it seems.

I looked around on the internet for other people having this issue, and they did. I saw 4 posts about it, and every one of them was version 2.2.3a. I'm using 2.2.7a, but it could still be a bug in the system. Unfortunately, none of these posts had replies.

I'm going to make a new thread since the issue is no longer WINS related.