file moved - now not authenticating to Active Directory

[Steven Cappiello]

Hi,

I had a G5 running FM Server 7 in my office authenticating off of Windows (NT?) Active Directory at my company.. the group name was of the syntax companygroupname

My company setup a Filemaker server on a windows box on a faster network with better backup routines.. so I figured I'd move my files.. the file that authenticates off of Active Directory stopped working.

This is all the info I have right now... the authentication settings on the Windows Box (filemaker accounts only vs. filemaker + external, etc.) are the same as on my mac.

Unfortunately, the PC is offsite and I don't have server admin rights, so I have to advise them as best I can..

Does anyone have any ideas or advice as to what questions I should be asking ??

Thanks,

beta

[Steven H. Blackwell]

Congratulations. You've been bitten by the Apple OS' peculiar method of returning the information from Active Directory. Remove the domain name from the start of the Group names in your file, and things should start working correctly.

HTH

Steven

[Steven Cappiello]

Unfortunately it didn't work

on the mac, the group was named "mskcc/skig"

I tried to change it to "skig"

and no luck, I also tried caps "SKIG"

(all without the quotation marks of course)

Any other ideas ? ? thanks

[Steven H. Blackwell]

Is the FileMaker Server CPU itself a properly authenticated member of the domain?

Also, you might take a look at the External Server Authentication Tech Brief found on the FMI web site:

http://www.filemaker.com/support/upgrade/techbriefs.html

Steven

[Steven Cappiello]

Thanks for the tips and the link to the techbrief Steven.

I was told that the Server CPU is bound to Active Directory (so I assume that means "yes"), I'll show your note to the tech who has access to the machine.

On the mac running Filemaker Server 7, I did *not* have the "Register FileMaker Server with a directory service" checkbox checked, and did not have the directory server name listed..

though, I *was* able to authenticate agains Active Directory groups.

Is that information (theoretically) required for the authentication to work ?

(is it possible Server might work without it on the Mac , but require it on the PC )

thanks Steven.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

On the mac running Filemaker Server 7, I did *not* have the "Register FileMaker Server with a directory service" checkbox checked, and did not have the directory server name listed..

Has [color:red]absolutely nothing to do with authentication on either platform. This is the "yellow pages" option to list the server for easy reference.

Steven

[Wim Decorte]

first you said:

My company setup a Filemaker server on a windows box on a faster network with better backup routines.. so I figured I'd move my files.. the file that authenticates off of Active Directory stopped working.

and then:

On the mac running Filemaker Server 7, I did *not* have the "Register FileMaker Server with a directory service" checkbox checked, and did not have the directory server name listed..

So I'm confused

What platform is the FMS running on? Win or Mac.

Also NT - like you're hinted at in your first post - didn't have Active Directory. AD was introduced with Server 2000. So if you have your domain authentication running on NT the FM external authentication will not work.

[Steven Cappiello]

:) sorry for the confusion.. part of which is created by my not having access to the company data center..

first, I was running FM Server 7 on a G5 OS 10.3.9. This mac was bound to our company's active directory and I was successful in having users log into databases using their NT ID.. in Filemaker, it was setup as an external account using the name of the group, which was mskccgroup (or mskcc/group) I think the first though

THEN, our company put up a Filemaker server on a PC running some version of Windows and Filemaker Server Advanced 7 This PC was also bound to the Active Directory. So, I figured I could just move my database over to this new superfast server. When I did, the external authentication stopped working. All server settings are the same as far as I can tell. I though it might have something to do with the need to add the "mskcc/" before the group name on the mac, Steven concurred.. however, when I removed this, it didn't help.

Any ideas for how to get external authentication working again on the PC filemaker server ?

Or suggestions for questions I should pose to my tech guys who have access to the PC?

thanks,

:P

Edited July 25, 2006 by Guest

[Wim Decorte]

Troubleshooting these things remotely is virtually impossible.

the domainnamegroupname format was only necessary for cross-platform deployments: when FMS was on OSX and the domain controller is on Windows. You don't need it now.

It sounds to me that the new server machine is not properly configured to a member server in the domain. Can you log into that machine with a user account that should work.

Also, verify that they actually did configure FMS to use external accounts.