Scope/Description

This article will guide how to configure a samba share to optimize performance and compatibility with MacOS
The following performance tunes have been tested with MacOS Big Sur (11.2.3). Previous/Future versions will benefit as well but trial and error are recommended.

Prerequisites

SMB Share
MacOS Client

Steps

SMB VFS Objects

It is best practice to use the following VFS Objects as parameters in your SMB share or global configuration when using MacOS clients.
Using catia and fruit in combination with streams_xattr significantly enhances performance/compatibility of samba network shares and OSX.
These can be applied in MacOS only or MacOS/Windows mixed environments.

[global]
vfs objects = catia fruit streams_xattr
fruit:nfs_aces = no
fruit:zero_file_id = yes
fruit:metadata = stream
fruit:encoding = native

The vfs objects = catia fruit streams_xattr, fruit:zero_file_id = yes, fruit:metadata = stream, fruit:encoding = native can be entered in either global or share section, however fruit:nfs_aces = no must be entered in the global section of the smb.conf

Spotlight Indexing

Once you are connected to an SMB share, open up a terminal window.
To enable spotlight indexing on a network drive type the following command

mdutil /Volumes/name -i on

To check the status of indexing on a connected network drive type the following commands

mdutil /Volumes/name -s

Once the indexing is complete, searching network volumes, specifically SMB shares should yield much quicker results

SMB Signing (MacOS 10.11.4 and Before)

Since the release of OS X 10.11.5, Apple’s SMB Signing has been enabled by default.
SMB Signing digitally signs at the packet level of the SMB communication. This enables the receiver of the packets to confirm the point of origin and it’s authenticity. This security mechanism helps avoid issues like tampering and “man in the middle” attacks – as long as you’re on a secure network. However, this causes poor performance – to disable this option see below.
On each Mac OSX client:

echo “[default]” » /etc/nsmb.conf
echo “signing_required=no” >> /etc/nsmb.conf

Reboot client
To verify it worked run:

smbutil statshares -a

If SIGNING_ON TRUE is not present, then signing is disabled

In macOS 10.13.4 and later, packet signing is off by default. Packet signing for SMB 2 or SMB 3 connections turns on automatically when needed if the server offers it.

Veto AppleDouble Files

Veto the creation of ._ and .DS_Store files on the network fileshare to increase directory performance.
Add to smb.conf [SHARE] definitions that will be used by OSX clients

veto files = /._*/.DS_Store/
delete veto files = yes

Delete existing ._ and .DS_Store files on the share

cd /FILE/SHARE ; find \( -name “.DS_Store” -or -name “.Trashes” -or -name “._*” -or -name “.TemporaryItems” \) -delete

On each OSX client, disable the creation of .DS_Store and ._ on network shares

defaults write com.apple.desktopservices DSDontWriteNetworkStores true

NOTE that certain OSX applications require these files to function correctly. Test workflow with these disabled to verify.

Verification

If we are to do a testparm -s on our SMB server, we should see the VFS Objects now appear within the global section, or the share section depending on where we entered it.

Troubleshooting

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