linux/linux network

alanbarnard · 02-18-2006, 01:15 PM

I am sure I must have missed something obvious here but this is my question anyway:

I have 'blackbox' running Ubuntu, I also have 'silverbox' which is dual-boot XP/Ubuntu with an NTFS, a FAT32, and an Ext3 partition.

Silverbox running Ubuntu can see all its own partitions. With siverbox running XP, blackbox can see all the drives and folders shared by Windows on silverbox.

But if siverbox is running Ubuntu, blackbox cannot see it. I tried sharing a folder in the Ext3 partition on silverbox. I was given the choice of Samba or NFS. I chose NFS as I was not intending sharing it with a Windows system. The Samba option subsequently disappeared so I cannot change it back if I ever wanted to. But I still cannot see it from blackbox.

Both computers are on a network with a combined DHCP server/printer server/router which all work fine - I can access the printer and the Internet from both computers.

I seem to find a lot about Linux/Windows networks, but as I want to ditch Windows completely, this is not what I want.

Can someone please tell me where I have gone wrong (not just RTFM).

Mara · 02-18-2006, 04:55 PM

How have you tried to access the NFS shares? Please show the commands/address (full) you have used.

imemyself · 02-19-2006, 01:47 AM

You probably won't see the share in any "Network Neighborhood" equivalents on the client box(the one that you want to access the share). You'll have to mount the NFS share yourself on the client. For example, if the directory that you shared was /var/cool_stuff on the server and you wanted to mount it to /mnt/cool_stuff on the client, you could run

Code:

mount silverbox:/var/cool_stuff /mnt/cool_stuff

(that does need to be run as root or by using sudo)
assuming that DNS or hosts files are set up alright so the client(blackbox I guess?) can find the IP address for silverbox. If that doesn't work, try substituting the IP address for silverbox in for silver box in the command above.

Once/if that all works, you would be able to access all of the stuff in the share in the /mnt/cool_stuff directory on your client box. You can also add a line to your /etc/fstab so that this share will me mounted their ever time your client computer starts.

alanbarnard · 02-19-2006, 01:23 PM

This is cut and pasted from Terminal on silverbox (hostname ubuntu)

alan@ubuntu:~$ sudo mkdir /mnt/alanblackbox
alan@ubuntu:~$ sudo mount blackbox:/home/alan mnt/alanblackbox
mount: can't get address for blackbox

alanbarnard · 02-19-2006, 01:58 PM

Total contents of various files on blackbox

/etc/aliases

# Added by installer for initial user
root: alan

/etc/hostname

blackbox

/etc/exports

# /etc/exports: the access control list for filesystems which may be exported
# to NFS clients. See exports(5).
/home/alan 192.168.100.0/255.255.255.0(rw)

/etc/resolv.conf

search barnardfamily
nameserver 192.168.100.100

/etc/hosts

127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain localhost blackbox

# The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
::1 ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
fe00::0 ip6-localnet
ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
ff02::2 ip6-allrouters
ff02::3 ip6-allhosts

/etc/hosts.allow
/etc/hosts.deny

Both files contain only comments

The Network Settings GUI in Gnome also says that eth0 is the default gateway and that the interface is active and the connection settings configuration is DHCP.

I have no control over my DHCP/print-server/router as the password was lost years ago but it has always worked fautlessly.

The DNS Server IP 192.168.100.100 is the one I always use for the network printer.

The printer works fine from both machines but it is configured as a Unix (LPD) printer (also works well in Windows). Is it possible that the DHCP/DNS server function is only configured to work in Windows?

Any help would be appreciated.

imemyself · 02-19-2006, 02:16 PM

You probably don't have the DNS server set up to map blackbox to whatever blackbox's IP address is. If you don't know what blackbox's IP address is, on blackbox run ifconfig.

Code:

eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:11:43:2F:5B:B5
          inet addr:192.168.2.16  Bcast:192.168.2.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:80028674 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:224359523 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:38041123059 (35.4 GiB)  TX bytes:197635233761 (184.0 GiB)
          Base address:0xccc0 Memory:ddfe0000-de000000

This is the output of ifconfig on one of my computers. In this case, the IP address is 192.168.2.16. So, first, just find the part where it says eth0 in the output from ifconfig. THen just look a line below that and see what it says for inet addr.

You can either mount the share on silverbox via this IP address that you just learned. Or, you can put that IP address in the /etc/hosts file and map it to a hostname. In /etc/hosts on silverbox, add a line that say

Code:

<IP Address of blackbox> blackbox

Then you should be able to access the share on blackbox by just using the name blackbox, not its IP address.

alanbarnard · 02-23-2006, 03:36 AM

I have spoken to my son who configured the DHCP server many years ago and it seems that it was not set up as a DNS.

Unfortunately my vintage No.9 Systems 'Ticket to Ride' AGP card has died and 'blackbox' has gone for a complete rebuild. So, end of experiment for the time being.