Submitted by “You probably have seen or heard about HomeGroup by now. We demonstrated it at PDC this year during Steven’s keynote, it was mentioned a few times at WinHec, and some of you may have even tried it on your PCs with the PDC pre-beta build of Windows 7. HomeGroup represents a new end-to-end approach to sharing in the home, an area in which Windows has provided many features before – the intuitive end to end is what’s new. HomeGroup recognizes and groups your Windows 7 PCs in a ‘simple to set up’ secure group that enables open access to media and digital memories in your home. With HomeGroup, you can share files in the home, stream music to your XBOX 360 or other devices, and print to the home printer without worrying about technical setup or even understanding how it all works. This blog post is designed to give you a behind-the-scenes look at how we designed HomeGroup.”
Just what we need, another way to have people set up and manage networks without having a clue how they work. Tech support should sue Microsoft for all the headaches their “innovations” have caused. Geeks say “users are idiots”, not because they’re stupid, but because they expect their computer to run on magic and dream dust and don’t bother trying to understand it. This will only make the problem worse than it already is. I thought file sharing in Windows was already easy enough (though it is easier in Linux – sorry, force of habit
), and it does already shield the user from complexity while still allowing access to the advanced options.
Are you 15 or something? I use Linux exclusively for as long as I remember(10+ years?), but your comment has me perplexed. You mean that my father has to understand how file sharing works? Otherwise he is not worthy enough to use a computer?
And NFS is easier to set up than Windows shares? Oh Really?
Kid, the problem is shared filesystems are showing their age plus the fact there is no common protocol across different platforms. They are definitely not easy enough to set up. Maybe for me and you and everyone that is computer literate, but that should not be the case.
Are you on something? Have you even tried it?
The end user shouldn’t have to understand it, they should just be able to use it. If this ‘innovation’ makes it easier, then we should be applauding it.
I shouldn’t have to understand how my car engine works in order to drive the car.
We should thank Microsoft for this because without them trying to make their PCs “just work” for everyone, we’d be out of jobs.
The end user IS an idiot, and that’s why I get paid.
Edited 2009-01-04 20:49 UTC
This all looks fine, but now there are two different network discovery/management systems in Windows.
There’s the old domain/workgroup system, and this new “homegroup” system. The homegroup system requires less management overhead, and is significantly easier to use.
How long before small businesses start to want these features?
Or worse, if a small business sets up a “homegroup” network then wants to upgrade to a domain-based network, they are pretty stuck (since, it appears that domains are only available for NLA “work” networks and homegroups are only available for NLA “home” networks, a single network cannot have both domain and homegroup functionality).
There have always been two, workgroups and domains are completely different things. And HomeGroup is just a fancy way of saying Workgroups 2.0.
Not they aren’t. A domain is simply a workgroup with a few extra features, like centralized authentication. From the perspective of a non-member, there is no difference between a domain and a workgroup. There is also an easy upgrade path from workgroup to domain as all you need to do is add a domain controller (then clients can be added to the domain at will).
Workgroups are peer to peer networks of computers. Name resolution is done via netbios. The only way to do anything on another computer is to have an account on that computer. No computer has control over another one.
Domains are networks set up by a domain controller. Name resolution is done via a DNS server. Your domain account determines your rights on any computer on the domain. Group policies can be pushed out over the network to control most features in windows is a very granular fashion. Domain admins have admin rights on every computer on the domain, and can do everything from lock it down to push out network wide deployments of software.
The computers communicate together with smb, that is the only similarity between domains and workgroups.
You seem to be confusing “features that require a domain” with “properties of a domain itself”.
As are domains. The only difference is that one peer has some extra services.
(You mean WINS) or DNS. There is nothing stopping you using DNS on a workgroup.
Correct, workgroups don’t have centralized authentication.
Sort of. You can add a domain controller to an existing workgroup to make it a domain.
Or WINS. While Windows 2000 and above force you to set up a DNS server when setting up a domain, there is no requirement for the members of the domain to actually use that DNS server. In fact, the domain can work perfectly fine in this way.
Its, far more complicated than that. A domain provides centralized authentication, but each computer can have it’s own security configuration, granting or not any rights to both domain and local users.
This is a feature that requires a domain, not a property of the domain itself.
Domain admins have admin rights on domain members by default, but you can easily remove the domain admins group from the local admins group. The ability to push software is another feature that requires a domain.
Basically, the properties of a domain are a superset of those of a workgroup.