Newbie windows gateway works but how to see anything from either pc on network
 

I am a newbie and managed to get the internet gateway up and running.
I have a Windows XP machine with adsl connection and a linux workstation that can duel boot till i get this sorted..
I am using this setup to learn Linux and chose Mandrake 9.1
As I can access the net from the linux box throught the XP server the network is obviously talking to each other.
What i cannot figure is how to share and access files from either machine so I can see them. I read quite a bit but am quite confused there must be a straight forward easy setup to this surely. Can anyone help or point me to some simple info to help me with this. Linus is sure alot different to WinXP so I am rather handicaped with a lot of windows knowlaedge and concepts and very few Linux ones... I am using KDE as my interface

Thanks

Shane

Do you have a share set up on your Windows box? If so you can use Konqueror (the KDE web browser). If the IP address of your Windows box is 192.168.1.10 then you would use the URL smb://192.168.1.10/shareame/ to access those files.

You'll need to use Samba in order to do that. The version of Samba (2.2.7a (?) w/ some security patches) included w/ Mandrake 9.1 is decent and I would suggest using that for now so that you don't need to download and install a program for now. I would suggest you go to a how to at www.samba.org to find out how to set up Samba and we can help you here if you have specific questions. There's a free copy of O'Reilly's Using Samba book online under documentation there. The URL is http://us1.samba.org/samba/docs/using_samba/toc.html. If you didn't install Samba when you set Mandrake up, it's a little more work. Since you didn't already install it in this case, it's probably best to download the most up-to-date version in an RPM form. The Mdk 9.1 RPMs are available at http://hostopia.samba.org/samba/ftp/...rake/RPMS/9.1/ download the services you need (should be client and server RPMs I believe; and you should prolly get the doc RPM too).
Make sure if you do enable Samba to check for security problems. With Samba running, I would suggest at least Mandrake's "high" level security, since "standard" security is really no better than Windows NT/2000/XP security (in other words, any 10 year old can crack it).

The WINXP machine has some folders shared and a few folders setup as "mapped" network drives. The linux box is duel boot and has the same setup as I tnd to run an FTP server for a few mates on the XP machine but store the files on the Linux/XP duel boot system so should be ok will go and try that.
One question: what do you mean by the "sharename"

The Winxp pro system is called AMD and has as an example a folder which is shared called "My Videos" static IP on Both PC's and submask of the 225.225.225.0 variety

Thanks for your help

I installed Samba after initial installation though when I look at the control panel bit whatever it is called I dont see "Servers"
listed along with things like hardware and software and boot etc along the left side which is where it should be according to the manual so that is a bit strange.
I will grab that book and have a good read thanks
Security at least at the moment wont be an issue as this is in my house and I have a pretty good firewall setup on the XP machine ut I certainly will do something about that after I get it setup.. levels are set to default at the moment and I didnt install the mandrake firewall as I didnt want any additional hassles that might throw me off setting the network up.

Cheers

Shane

Meant to ask how and where will the Linux boxes shares be visiable in the Windows XP machine when setup correctly ?

Thanks

(THIS IS Assuming you have Samba up and running on the linux box)
- On XP, Start by opening my computer
- Hit "Ctrl + f" click search for computers on the network type in your linux IP
- then login to the linux box when you find it.
- You may now map drives etc.
If you get an error when trying to access the linux box and it does show in the search, then you need to check if plain text passwords is enabled for third party smb servers.

Hope this helps;

dont forget to set your linux shares in the samba.conf file or you will see jack s@@t from windows