2.1.2 Relationship with External Components

The File Services Management system interacts with several other Windows components. The following diagram shows the key interactions.

Figure 1: Components interacting with the File Services Management system

File server, file system, domain controller, and printer services are used by the File Services Management system (FSM system).

File server: A computer hosting one or more instances of a file service, for example, an instance of an SMB file service. A File Services Management system is used to configure the file servers. File servers use file systems to store information in the form of files.

File system: A hierarchical store for persistence of user and application data. The File Services Management system uses a file system to store configuration data and to retrieve the properties of the file system objects. The File Services Management system depends on an external object store for storing files and directories, and for changing the configuration of the file system objects. In Windows, the object store is provided by a local file system, usually the NTFS file system.

Domain controller: Used to store Distributed File System (DFS) namespace metadata if a domain-based namespace is created. The domain controller is also used to store File Replication Service (FRS) objects, which store the configuration that is related to all replication members.

Printer services: Printers can be shared by using the File Services Management system. The system uses printer services to provide printer sharing, where printers can be accessed as described in [MS-PRSOD]. FSMOD protocols are used to configure the printers and present them to users.

Admin tool: A tool that provides management functionality to the administrator. The admin tool uses the File Services Management system to configure and retrieve configuration information for the file servers. It is also used to configure and query the state of the file services.