AppleTalk Remote Access: Setting Up Security Zones

I have these questions about setting up a security zone:

1) Can I change any part of the name? For instance, change the first 3 letters to conform with our naming convention.

2) If two or more security zones are introduced to the network, do I have to type multiple passwords? If I have one password, will it work for the entire network? Is it possible for two security zones to be on the network?

3) If I create a security zone with a password to set up the network properly, and the zone goes away, does the password continue to work? If a second zone is then introduced, will it continue to function or will I need a new password?

1) No part of the SecurityZone name can deviate from that produced by the Security Stack. There are three characters that could be used before the 32-character zone name limit is exceeded, but then the AppleTalk Remote Access stations won't recognize it as a security zone.

2) You can have up to 16 security zones on a network. Each must have a different password (implied due to zone naming rules), and a user setting up a server need only know one of them. The software will search the entire zone list for a security zone with a matching password. This allows the administrator to group authorized servers and enable or disable groups as needed.

3) Just to clarify, a security zone will affect any AppleTalk Remote Access station on the same AppleTalk network, be it a LAN or WAN. The entire zone list is searched, and if a security zone is present, a password will be required. This is checked both at the time the answering station is set up, and during each connection attempt.

If you set up the answering station while disconnected from the network, the software wouldn't see the zone, and wouldn't ask for the password. But once you reconnected, and a remote user dialed in, the software would see the security zone and disable remote access. The same would happen if the security zone were set up after a station was set up to answer calls.

Also, there is a potentially annoying problem with the Security Stack used to generate the DES encrypted zone name. The field used to display the password is a couple of pixels too narrow and truncates the last character of the encrypted password. If you create a zone with this errant zone name, none of the answering stations will recognize it as a security zone.

The way to fix this is to widen the field slightly so the final character is visible. Use the HyperCard field tool (in authoring mode) to stretch the field bounds as needed, or enter the following command from the message window. It will correct the Zone field width to show the entire zone name.

set width of cd fld "Zone" to 236