Error I do not have admin rights. Ubuntu 8.04.1 trying to set up samba

moparcrazy · 10-21-2008, 07:49 PM

I have just finally made the big step and switched from XP to Ubuntu 8.04.1. I have formated my drives on my Dell Inspiron 6000 laptop and now have a single boot system. I have been trying to about 8 hours now to get samba to work. The reason I posted in the security forum is because in all the stuff that I have found for samba I need to access and rights to change config files and need admin rights.

One of the things that I was told to do was to boot up in recovery mode and then type "addgroup moparcrazy admin". When I type this in it says that I am already an admin, but when I get back into to Ubuntu and try and edit a config file it says that I do not have amdin rights.

The second thing is if someone would be able to help me with getting samba to work. I don't understand how to use it. I am needing to get some info off of my other laptop that has XP before I switch it to Ubuntu. I need to figure out how to use samba so I can get my network working on my two laptops. I am also going to be switching my desktop over (or at least a duel boot [my tv capture card is not supported]) soon. I am trying to get the info tonight so I can format and install Ubuntu on my other laptop tonight (Sony).

Thank you for your time.

PS My wife and I love this Ubuntu

LinuxCrayon · 10-21-2008, 08:55 PM

While I'm not a Samba pro, nor an Ubuntu pro, I think I know where your frustration comes from.

You are _technically_ an admin. Here's the way it works: almost every user does not have root access. Root is the user which can do anything and everything without ever being asked if he's sure. Ubuntu does _not_ have an accessible root user by default. Instead, to perform administrative actions, you need to prefix 'sudo' to all console commands. This should fix your need to have administrative rights.

So, in short:
just type

Code:

sudo command

Let us know if this helps or if you continue to have problems.

moparcrazy · 10-21-2008, 09:10 PM

I have been seeing a lot of this, type the command, and I am so new to linux that I do not know where they and you are talking about to type the sudo command. I have been struggling with this figuring linux out.

Thanks

LinuxCrayon · 10-21-2008, 09:13 PM

Ah. Okay. I was under the assumption that the tutorials had informed you to open a terminal.

You can do this 1 of 2 ways.

The point & click way (and longer):
Click Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal

The quick way:
Press 'ALT+F2'; type 'terminal'; press 'enter'. This should all be done without the single quoation (') marks.

moparcrazy · 10-21-2008, 09:15 PM

Where is the tutorial that you talk about. When I installed the software it never asked me to go through a tutorial. I think if I do through this it would really help me out with some of my problems.

LinuxCrayon · 10-21-2008, 09:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by moparcrazy

The reason I posted in the security forum is because in all the stuff that I have found for samba I need to access and rights to change config files and need admin rights.

I inferred that you had followed a tutorial or some kind of documentation.

http://www.jonathanmoeller.com/screed/?p=181
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad17kma8rNM
http://swik.net/Samba+Tutorial

Those should get you started. Again, I'm not a Samba expert. But those should get you where you need to go, or at least get you on the right track.

moparcrazy · 10-22-2008, 02:10 AM

I am still not able to get connected to any other computer on the network. I have gone through the walkthroughs that were suggested but none of them worked. I tried to the first link twice and I was not able to get my xp to see my laptop I also tried to watch and follow the second link but I do not have a shared folder were it said that I should. Then I tied to do the third link and there again nothing happened. Now when I try and open us the command "sudo /etc/initd/samba restart" nothing happens I do not see the terminal screen.

PS one other thing that I do not understand is that ever since I installed Ubuntu my hard drive has not stopped running I don't know what this is all about. It has continually ran for the last 24 hours.

Is there another way to get connected to my network?

anon089 · 10-22-2008, 03:32 AM

on gnome look at
places >Network Servers

a window should appear showing the computers on your network. if you only see windows Network here click on that other wise click on the laptop.

it should give you access to any shared folders on the windows laptop. you can then copy over what you need.

Fred Caro · 10-22-2008, 08:42 AM

Much of the following will be geuss work but a shared folder solution is usually between the same o/s. Samba is an interface in its own right, it needs activating and then will add a suffix to a file to make it readable cross-platform, at least I think so!
As for root in Ubuntu it depends how it is set up, typically you use the same password for root as user. Bascically Ubuntu does not behave in the same way as most other popular versions of Linux.

Fred.

sydney-troz · 10-22-2008, 09:39 AM

Quote:

Samba is an interface in its own right, it needs activating and then will add a suffix to a file to make it readable cross-platform

Samba will not add any prefixes to anything, at least none of the documentation I've ever read says that and in my experience (2 yrs) of working with it, no such thing has ever happened.

Quote:

As for root in Ubuntu it depends how it is set up, typically you use the same password for root as user.

The root user in Ubuntu is disabled -- it is not possible, with the default configuration, to login as root. To do anything with root privileges, you have to use sudo, which is a command that lets you run a single command as the root user, by re-entering your own password.

moparcrazy · 10-25-2008, 03:25 PM

I am still not able to get Samba to connect to the windows computers. I have been through all 4 different walk throughs on how to set it up but the video is for an older version of Ubuntu. The first link that was given to me did nothing. I still can not see any computer on the network. I have also tried 2 others with no luck. I must not be doing something right.

I also decided to reinstall Ubuntu thinking that maybe something was wrong with the installation that I did. I then tried all the walk throughs again to see if any one of the them would work and they don't.

I am at a lose. I don't have a clue what I am doing wrong. I figure that it has to be me because there are lots of other people using and with going through 4 walk throughs with still no good result that it has to be me.

In each of the walk throughs there is small parts that are not the same on my system. On one file path name is not the same. I think that I am going to just have to revert to using DVD to transfer files.

Thanks

sydney-troz · 10-25-2008, 04:00 PM

Which path was different? The procedure should be exactly the same for all default installations of the same version of Ubuntu, so that's odd. Another thing to check would be which workgroup your windows machine is on -- some machines default to MSHOME, while I think the Samba default is WORKGROUP. I'm assuming here that you're trying to see your Ubuntu machine from your windows machine? If you're trying to see your windows machine from your Ubuntu, you shouldn't need to set anything up after installing Ubuntu.

In case this is a networking issue, can you ping from one machine to the other? On your linux box, open a terminal, and type

Code:

ifconfig | grep 'inet addr' | grep -v '127.0.0.1' | awk '{print $2}'

You should get back a line something like addr:xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx where the x's are numbers -- note these 4 numbers. On your windows box, open a command prompt (Start->Run... enter cmd and hit enter), and type

Code:

ping xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

using the number you noted from the command on your linux box. You should see some lines starting with "Reply from xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx" being printed at fairly regular intervals. If not, the problem is with your networking.

moparcrazy · 10-26-2008, 01:14 PM

I think that I am getting there. Right now I can see the Ubuntu from my xp (and yes mshome is my windows network that is one problem) but I am not able to get access to Ubuntu. When I try it says "//MOPARCRAZY-LAPTOPSamba 3.0.28a is not accessible. You might not have permission to use this network resource. Contact the administrator of this server to find out if you have access permissionsd. The network path was not found." I think that there is just a small change to get this working.

Thanks

PS I tried to ping and I got under the inet addr that there was no host.

sydney-troz · 10-26-2008, 01:28 PM

Since this is your home network, the easiest way to fix that would be to add the lines

Code:

guest ok = yes
writable = yes
public = yes

to your smb.conf file for the share you're trying to access. Make sure to remove any lines conflicting with these. After you've added these, so a "sudo /etc/init.d/samba restart". The directory you're writing to must also be world-writable in this case:

Code:

cd /path/to/shared/directory
chmod 777 .

Note that this is NOT a secure configuration! But it should work for a home network, at least temporarily. I'd recommend taking that share offline as soon as you're done using it, or at least removing write permission for all users.

moparcrazy · 10-26-2008, 01:51 PM

Here is what my config file show. I got this from another forum. Where should I put the command?

; /etc/smb.conf
;
; Make sure and restart the server after making changes to this file, ex:
; /etc/rc.d/init.d/smb stop
; /etc/rc.d/init.d/smb start

[global]
; Uncomment this if you want a guest account
; guest account = nobody
log file = /var/log/samba-log.%m
lock directory = /var/lock/samba
share modes = yes

[homes]
comment = Home Directories
browseable = no
read only = no
create mode = 0750

[tmp]
comment = Temporary file space
path = /tmp
read only = no
public = yes

[public]
comment = Public Stuff
path = /home/public
public = yes
writable = yes
printable = no