The Domain Master Browser is necessary on a routed TCP/IP network, that is, when a Windows domain spans more than one TCP/IP network. When a Windows domain spans multiple subnets each of the subnets has an independent browser called the Master Browser. The Master Browser is responsible for the browse list within its respective subnet and portion of the domain on its subnet. The Domain Master Browser is used to collect information from each of the Master Browsers via the NetServerEnum API call. Once collected the list is merged with the Domain Master Browsers list for its own subnet. This merged list forms the enterprise wide browse list for the domain. This merged list is then distributed to the Master Browsers in each subnet so that the enterprise list can be available to computers requesting services. [1]
Routing is the process of selecting a path for traffic in a network, or between or across multiple networks. Broadly, routing is performed in many types of networks, including circuit-switched networks, such as the public switched telephone network (PSTN), and computer networks, such as the Internet.
The Internet protocol suite is the conceptual model and set of communications protocols used in the Internet and similar computer networks. It is commonly known as TCP/IP because the foundational protocols in the suite are the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP). It is occasionally known as the Department of Defense (DoD) model because the development of the networking method was funded by the United States Department of Defense through DARPA.
A subnetwork or subnet is a logical subdivision of an IP network. The practice of dividing a network into two or more networks is called subnetting.
As part of the Microsoft Windows Server Operating Systems, the browser service is used to host information of other Windows computers within the same Windows domain or TCP/IP network... [2] the Domain Master Browser coordinates browse lists from all the local browsers in a workgroup, no matter what their network segments. [3] Browsing in these terms is specific to viewing network resources within the Windows network such as the available domains and computers. The information, called a Browse List, is held by the browser and primarily consists of the computer names and the services each of the computers offers. There are several browser roles: the Backup Browser, the Master Browser, and the Domain Master Browser.
Microsoft Corporation (MS) is an American multinational technology company with headquarters in Redmond, Washington. It develops, manufactures, licenses, supports and sells computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services. Its best known software products are the Microsoft Windows line of operating systems, the Microsoft Office suite, and the Internet Explorer and Edge web browsers. Its flagship hardware products are the Xbox video game consoles and the Microsoft Surface lineup of touchscreen personal computers. As of 2016, it is the world's largest software maker by revenue, and one of the world's most valuable companies. The word "Microsoft" is a portmanteau of "microcomputer" and "software". Microsoft is ranked No. 30 in the 2018 Fortune 500 rankings of the largest United States corporations by total revenue.
Microsoft Windows is a group of several graphical operating system families, all of which are developed, marketed, and sold by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. Active Windows families include Windows NT and Windows Embedded; these may encompass subfamilies, e.g. Windows Embedded Compact or Windows Server. Defunct Windows families include Windows 9x, Windows Mobile and Windows Phone.
Windows Server is a brand name for a group of server operating systems released by Microsoft. It includes all Windows operating systems that are branded "Windows Server", but not any other Microsoft product. The first Windows server edition to be released under that brand was Windows Server 2003. However, the first server edition of Windows was Windows NT 3.1 Advanced Server, followed by Windows NT 3.5 Server, Windows NT 4.0 Server, and Windows 2000 Server; the latter was the first server edition to include Active Directory, DNS Server, DHCP Server, Group Policy, SQL Server, as well as many other popular features used today.
The Domain Master Browser is located on the domain Primary Domain Controller, or PDC. [4]
Active Directory (AD) is a directory service that Microsoft developed for the Windows domain networks. It is included in most Windows Server operating systems as a set of processes and services. Initially, Active Directory was only in charge of centralized domain management. Starting with Windows Server 2008, however, Active Directory became an umbrella title for a broad range of directory-based identity-related services.
Samba is a free software re-implementation of the SMB networking protocol, and was originally developed by Andrew Tridgell. Samba provides file and print services for various Microsoft Windows clients and can integrate with a Microsoft Windows Server domain, either as a Domain Controller (DC) or as a domain member. As of version 4, it supports Active Directory and Microsoft Windows NT domains.
An ephemeral port is a short-lived transport protocol port for Internet Protocol (IP) communications. Ephemeral ports are allocated automatically from a predefined range by the IP stack software. An ephemeral port is typically used by the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), User Datagram Protocol (UDP), or the Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) as the port assignment for the client end of a client–server communication to a well-known port on a server.
NetBIOS is an acronym for Network Basic Input/Output System. It provides services related to the session layer of the OSI model allowing applications on separate computers to communicate over a local area network. As strictly an API, NetBIOS is not a networking protocol. Older operating systems ran NetBIOS over IEEE 802.2 and IPX/SPX using the NetBIOS Frames (NBF) and NetBIOS over IPX/SPX (NBX) protocols, respectively. In modern networks, NetBIOS normally runs over TCP/IP via the NetBIOS over TCP/IP (NBT) protocol. This results in each computer in the network having both an IP address and a NetBIOS name corresponding to a host name.
Zero-configuration networking (zeroconf) is a set of technologies that automatically creates a usable computer network based on the Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) when computers or network peripherals are interconnected. It does not require manual operator intervention or special configuration servers. Without zeroconf, a network administrator must set up network services, such as Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and Domain Name System (DNS), or configure each computer's network settings manually.
In computing, directory service or name service maps the names of network resources to their respective network addresses. It is a shared information infrastructure for locating, managing, administering and organizing everyday items and network resources, which can include volumes, folders, files, printers, users, groups, devices, telephone numbers and other objects. A directory service is a critical component of a network operating system. A directory server or name server is a server which provides such a service. Each resource on the network is considered an object by the directory server. Information about a particular resource is stored as a collection of attributes associated with that resource or object.
In computer networking, Server Message Block (SMB), one version of which was also known as Common Internet File System, operates as an application-layer network protocol mainly used for providing shared access to files, printers, and serial ports and miscellaneous communications between nodes on a network. It also provides an authenticated inter-process communication mechanism. Most usage of SMB involves computers running Microsoft Windows, where it was known as "Microsoft Windows Network" before the introduction of Active Directory. Corresponding Windows services are LAN Manager Server and LAN Manager Workstation.
IPX/SPX stands for Internetwork Packet Exchange/Sequenced Packet Exchange. IPX and SPX are networking protocols used primarily on networks using the Novell NetWare operating systems.
Windows Internet Name Service (WINS) is Microsoft's implementation of NetBIOS Name Service (NBNS), a name server and service for NetBIOS computer names. Effectively, WINS is to NetBIOS names what DNS is to domain names — a central mapping of host names to network addresses. Like the DNS, it is implemented in two parts, a server service and a TCP/IP client component which manages the client's registration and renewal of names, and takes care of queries.
The computer file hosts is an operating system file that maps hostnames to IP addresses. It is a plain text file. Originally a file named HOSTS.TXT was manually maintained and made available via file sharing by Stanford Research Institute for the ARPANET membership, containing the hostnames and address of hosts as contributed for inclusion by member organizations. The Domain Name System, first described in 1983 and implemented in 1984, automated the publication process and provided instantaneous and dynamic hostname resolution in the rapidly growing network. In modern operating systems, the hosts file remains an alternative name resolution mechanism, configurable often as part of facilities such as the Name Service Switch as either the primary method or as a fallback method.
Internet Connection Sharing (ICS) is a Windows service that enables one Internet-connected computer to share its Internet connection with other computers on a local area network (LAN). The computer that shares its Internet connection serves a gateway device, meaning that all traffic between other computers and the Internet go through this computer. ICS provides Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and network address translation (NAT) services for the LAN computers.
In computing, netstat
is a command-line network utility tool that displays network connections for the Transmission Control Protocol, routing tables, and a number of network interface and network protocol statistics. It is available on Unix-like operating systems including macOS, Linux, Solaris, and BSD, and is available on Windows NT-based operating systems including Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10.
On Microsoft Servers, a domain controller (DC) is a server computer that responds to security authentication requests within a Windows domain. A domain is a concept introduced in Windows NT whereby a user may be granted access to a number of computer resources with the use of a single username and password combination.
NetBIOS over TCP/IP is a networking protocol that allows legacy computer applications relying on the NetBIOS API to be used on modern TCP/IP networks.
Messenger service is a network-based system notification Windows service by Microsoft that was included in some earlier versions of Microsoft Windows.
In computing, Microsoft's Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 introduced in 2007/2008 a new networking stack named Next Generation TCP/IP stack, to improve on the previous stack in several ways. The stack includes native implementation of IPv6, as well as a complete overhaul of IPv4. The new TCP/IP stack uses a new method to store configuration settings that enables more dynamic control and does not require a computer restart after a change in settings. The new stack, implemented as a dual-stack model, depends on a strong host-model and features an infrastructure to enable more modular components that one can dynamically insert and remove.
Browser service or Computer Browser Service is a feature of Microsoft Windows to let users easily browse and locate shared resources in neighboring computers. This is done by aggregating the information in a single computer "Browse Master". All other computers contact this computer for information and display in the Network Neighborhood window.
In computer networking, TCP Fast Open (TFO) is an extension to speed up the opening of successive Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) connections between two endpoints. It works by using a TFO cookie, which is a cryptographic cookie stored on the client and set upon the initial connection with the server. When the client later reconnects, it sends the initial SYN packet along with the TFO cookie data to authenticate itself. If successful, the server may start sending data to the client even before the reception of the final ACK packet of the three-way handshake, skipping that way a round-trip delay and lowering the latency in the start of data transmission.
Packet Sender is an open source utility to allow sending and receiving TCP and UDP packets. It also supports TCP connections using SSL. It is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. It is licensed GNU General Public License v2 and is free software. Packet Sender's web site says "It's designed to be very easy to use while still providing enough features for power users to do what they need.".
Network Performance Monitor (NPM) is a solution in Operations Management Suite that monitors network performance between office sites, data centers, clouds and applications in near real-time. It helps a Network Administrator locate and troubleshoot bottlenecks like network delay, data loss and availability of any network link across on-premises networks, Microsoft Azure VNets, Amazon Web Services VPCs, hybrid networks, VPNs or even public internet links.