> Is coda a viable
> solution for sharing /home on a network? Is it possible to map
> Unix UIDs to Coda users? Is it possible to somehow automatically
> mount (perhaps via PAM) the home directory on a coda filesystem
> with the correct permissions?

That's what Ivan Popov did for a couple of years...
Read a mail from him about mozilla little trouble a couple monthes ago...

Why do you want to map id ??? Coda has his internal authentification sytem as an
auth2 server, and his own rights system. But if necessary you can setup pdb with
id identical to you unix ones..

Have you searched the pam_coda.so ? 
Sure you gonna find !!! :o)

> I also had an idea of having *big* files (with, say, an ext3
> filesystem in them) and mounting them from the coda filesystem
> via a loopback device to get around the problem of requiring Unix
> UID in the home directory. Which raises two questions:

2GB maximum file size ... somes recent fixes, but i did not have really tested
as it's really enough for me...
If you mean a file sytem tree , a disk partition, a disk, mutilple disk, or a
lot of disk over a lot of server with coda ( and ext3 or jfs or reiserfs or xfs
or...) the answer is YES !

> 1. Can coda do little (incremental) updates to a big file, or
> would it update the whole file with every single change (which
> would defeat the purpose really)?

Good question... I would reponse single if asked.

> 2. Does it make sense at all?

If you plan something like a 2-10GB-one-file ( 3D-video ? ) storage under coda,
i would say no.. 
In other case, assuming normal files, i think venus caching system could really
help you. 


Cordialy
Lionix
FS-cluster Newbee Administrator

http://www.absium.com