OpenAFS for Windows
OpenAFS is the world's foremost location independent file system.
With OpenAFS for Windows, users of Microsoft Windows 2000, XP, 2003, XP64, Vista
(32-bit and 64-bit editions) and Server 2008 (32-bit and 64-bit editions) can make the most of this proven data sharing
solution. The OpenAFS Project provides binary installation packages
appropriate for both individual users and organizations with thousands
of members.
Contents:
The following guidelines should be used for choosing an installer type. If you are upgrading
from a previous installation, select the same type of installer, EXE or MSI, as was
previously installed on the system. If you are installing for the first time, choose the
EXE if you are installing manually and the MSI if you either need to customize the
installation package (via a transform) or wish to deploy via Active Directory Group Policy.
Each installer is provided in debug and non-debug versions. The debug versions should
be installed only when you are experiencing a problem and you need to assist
the OpenAFS developers in debugging the problem. The non-debug version is optimized for
performance, does not generate logging information by default, and does not install
symbol files.
All of the installers are produced and signed by
Secure Endpoints Inc.. If the signature is missing do not complete the installation
process and send e-mail to
openafs-security@openafs.org
Secure Endpoints Inc. periodically publishes a report on the current status of OpenAFS for Windows development. The
most recent report
was published in July 2008.
Read it today!
(updated 30 May 2009) 
Features:
- Starting with the 1.5.50 release of OpenAFS for Windows,
each of the AFS Client Service, the AFS Explorer Shell Extension, and the
command-line tools are Unicode enabled. No longer is OpenAFS restricted to
accessing file system objects whose names can be represented in the locale
specific OEM code page. This has significant benefits for end users. Most
importantly it permits non-Western languages to now be used for file system
object names in AFS from Microsoft Windows operating systems. Now that
Unicode names are supported,
Roaming User Profiles and
Folder
Redirection will no longer fail when a user attempts
to store an object with a name that cannot be represented in the OEM code
page.
- Compatible with all OpenAFS and IBM/Transarc AFS Server versions
- Support for all editions of Windows Vista including SP1 and Windows
Server 2008
- 2007 Daylight Savings Time corrected C Runtime Library DLLs
- AFS credentials module for MIT Kerberos for Windows Network Identity Manager
- Support for 64-bit File Sizes on both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of
Microsoft Windows
- Support for 64-bit Windows XP/2003/R2/Vista/2008
- Implements Windows Byte Range Locking backed by AFS File Server Locks
- Implements Inline Bulk Status RPCs which speeds up directory listings
- Uses GetCapabilities RPCs to probe the server status
- Logs fs crypt state to the Windows Event Log
- Supports OutputDebugString debugging of the RX Library
- New command: fs uuid [-generate]
- Improved CIFS protocol compatibility
- Hard Dead and Connection Timeout values restricted to the CIFS Session Timeout value.
- Improved handling of Windows Standby/Hibernate modes when network access
is not available
- Significant performance improvements when searching directories
containing hundreds or thousands of files and sub-directories
- Reduced time required for file open operations
- Fixes a write data corruption error that exists in all versions of
OpenAFS prior to 1.5.15
- Increased cache hit ratio for data written to AFS by the local client
- Eliminates "out of volumes" and "out of buffers" panic conditions
- Improved behavior when used behind Network Address Translation (NAT)
devices
- As of 1.5.18, OpenAFS for Windows no longer attempts to push Kerberos v5 tickets into the logon session.
This functionality is available in MIT Kerberos for Windows 3.1 and above.
- Fixes a bug that could result in a failure of Microsoft Windows to
boot successfully. See
Security Advisory OPENAFS-SA-2007-002
- Improved Explorer Shell behavior when listing directories without "read"
permission.
- Lower CPU utilization and overall performance improvements than 1.5.20
and earlier
- The AFS Server Manager no longer terminates unexpectedly
- Infinite recursions in chains of directory objects up to 512 levels deep
are detected and prevented.
- Data that is known to be valid will continue to be served by the cache
manager when all servers are down.
- Improved directory search performance when
compared to 1.5.21 and earlier. Especially after directory updates and
when searching for files that do not exist.
- Partial chunks are written to the file server whenever possible
improving write performance.
- Default chunk size increased to 1MB from 128KB as of 1.5.23 improving
read and write performance.
- The 1.5.31 release fixes a bug that would prevent failover when a volume
cannot be attached by a single file server instance.
- The 1.5.32 more than doubles the throughput of both reads and writes
when compared to previous releases. One 1Gbit/second networks peak
transfer rates of up to 32MB/second have been recorded between the cache
manager and the file server.
- The 1.5.39 release fixes several memory leaks.
- The 1.5.51 and 1.5.52 releases fixes bugs introduced in 1.5.50 related to the fs and
symlink commands; large file support; smb virtual circuit cleanup
operations; and Windows 2000 support.
- The 1.5.53 release fixes bugs introduced in 1.5.50 as well as a
significant memory leak (rx packets) in the rx rpc protocol library.
- The 1.5.56 and 1.5.57 releases fixes race conditions in the rx rpc protocol
library that can result in the AFS Client Service terminating prematurely.
- The 1.5.57 release fixes the missing runtime dll problem when opening
the AFS Configuration Tool.
- The 1.5.58 release fixes a problem with server failover introduced in
1.5.53.
- The 1.5.59 release improves compatibility with the Windows SMB
redirector and boosts the priority class of the service to High to match the
priority of the system components depending on the timeliness of the service
response.
- The 1.5.60 release converts all documentation to Windows HTML Help and
registry support for CellServDB information.
Documentation:
Supported Platforms::
- Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 (X86 and AMD64) are not yet officially
supported.
- The only known incompatibility is an inability to browse \\AFS
- Windows Server 2008 (X86 and AMD64)
- Windows Vista (X86 and AMD64) including SP1
- Windows 2003 64 (AMD64)
- Windows XP 64 (AMD64) including SP1 and SP2
- Windows 2003 R2
- Windows 2003 including SP1 and SP2
- Windows XP including SP2 and SP3
- Windows 2000 Workstation and Server at SP4
* Installers for Itanium systems are unavailable. Organizations
interested in support for Itanium should consider donating a
development/test system to OpenAFS.
Known Issues:
- If a *beta* AFS plug-in for Network Identity Manager is installed, it must be uninstalled before OpenAFS
1.5.60 is installed. Otherwise, an error indicating that the plug-in cannot be installed because the appropriate version of
OpenAFS is not installed will be generated.
- The AFS plug-in for Network Identity Manager provided as part of OpenAFS
1.5.60 requires MIT Kerberos for Windows 3.1 or above.
- Directory and File Change Notifications are ignored when accessing AFS via
UNC paths
- Windows Vista Specific Issues
- The help files provided with OpenAFS are in .HLP format.
WinHlp32.exe must be
downloaded separately from Microsoft. Secure Endpoints Inc. is funding the
development of compatible HtmlHelp (.CHM) files.
- The AFS Systray Tool (afscreds.exe) and AFS Control Panel (afs_config.exe)
are not User Account Control (UAC) compatible. In order to start/stop the
AFS service or to modify the configuration of the AFS client service they must
be "Run as Administrator".
Downloads for 32-bit Windows operating systems: 2008/Vista/R2/2003/XP/2000:
Downloads for 64-bit Windows operating systems: 2008/Vista/R2/2003/XP (AMD64):
Support for 32-bit Windows Applications on 64-bit Windows operating systems.
This installer is required for any 32-bit applications that require use of
AFS libraries. This includes 32-bit versions of MIT Kerberos for
Windows.
Note: In 64-bit versions of Microsoft Windows there are 64-bit and 32-bit
versions of the command prompt and the Explorer Shell. It is very
important when installing applications that the installers be started from a
64-bit process. It is strongly recommended that the Add/Remove Programs
Control Panel be used to initiate installations on 64-bit Microsoft Windows
operating systems.
OpenAFS for Windows depends on
MIT
Kerberos for Windows (KFW) to provide Kerberos v5 functionality.
The recommended version for
OpenAFS for Windows 1.5.60 is version 3.2.2 or above.
Microsoft Hotfixes
Just as OpenAFS releases fixes on a continuous basis, so does Microsoft for their Windows products.
If they are security related or deemed to be critical to the entire user base these hot fixes are
pushed out via Microsoft's Windows Update service. However, if the fix is considered to be relevant
only to a small user community, the hot fix is made available via a posting to
Microsoft KnowledgeBase. When a new service pack is
issued all of the outstanding hot fixes are rolled up and regression tested together.
OpenAFS for Windows is highly dependent on the correct operation of Microsoft's SMB redirector
network file system driver and the Netbios communication stack. Over the years there have been
a large number of bugs found and fixed within these two subsystems. At the present time there
a hot fixes that have been issued by Microsoft which have yet to be bundled into a service pack
for XP 32-bit, XP 64-bit and Server 2003. Hot Fixes that are considered
critical for OpenAFS users are marked as such below.
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and XP64
The current service pack level is 2.
Microsoft Windows XP
The current service pack level is 3.