Tiger server with NetInfo upgraded to Leopard: no way to connect with ServerAdmin

[rcfa]

Hi,

I upgraded my server and it seemed to go all smooth. I can log in on the console, etc. but when I try to launch ServerAdmin, it always tells me that there is no such server or that the username/password are wrong.

My suspicion is, but I can’t confirm that, that the upgrade scripts migrate the local NetInfo into the Local directory service domain, but that higher level NetInfo domains are not migrated, and that I may have some invalid/empty/nonfunctional OpenDirectory setup now.

The question is, how can I get the server to behave enough that I can access ServerAdmin and WorkgroupManager, such that I can configure the server. Right now, I can log in, but I can’t change anything in the configuration, and since I turned off mail before the upgrade, I can’t even send or receive mail..

Any ideas of what’s going on?

I do have a disk image with the server’s state before the upgrade, so all that information is available. I can, if need be, revert back to 10.4.11, or use that to migrate information to a new server install.

The question is, how to migrate, if need be, without losing gigabytes of IMAP mail, etc.

Any hints?

[rcfa]

Well, my NetInfo infrastructure dates back to 1990, and has been migrated forward ever since, so I know all about the bad and great of NetInfo 😉

Turns out, besides the NetInfo/ServerAdmin matter, there are also general problems with the machine, an 800MHz iMac G4.
I know, not officially supported, but given that a 25MHz 040 NeXT with 64MB RAM was able to handle all my lilttle domain’s e-mail, DNS and web serving, one would hope that an 800MHz G4 with 1GB of RAM could do the same, despite not being officially supported.

But no such luck: something in the OS is written in such a way that the machine is constantly pegged at 100% CPU load, plus it crashes/freezes reliably within anywhere from 5 minutes to an hour after boot. First thought it is the less than clean upgrade, so I took a FW drive and did a clean install on that, same thing: crashes left and right.

At that point, I bit the bullet and restored 10.4.11 from backup. Would have replaced that machine a long time ago, if Apple would finally sell a Santa Rosa based MacMini that can take 4GB RAM and has 802.11draftN networking built-in. Took forever to even get a Core2Duo CPU in these machines, but without the 4GB RAM the upgrade isn’t worth it, because at that point I want to be able to run a virtualized Linux based VoIP PBX on the machine, too; and 2GGB RAM isn’t enough for that.

[Author]

Posts