hi we are trying to set up a network of linux/red_hat/windows machines here in the office. Presently it's just the 3 of us but we plan on adding more people soon.

We have a new Dell server running FC4. This would be our file server we want it ro run NFS so that other linux machines can mount a directory it will export (say, /work) and put all our files in the server. The other machines are 2 RH workstations and an FC4 laptop. I tried putting /work in the /etc/exports file of the server then went to one of the clients (laptop) and typed:

mount -t nfs 192.168.15.105:/work /

and it said the server was down so that's the first question, what's up with that? do i have to explicitly type a command on the server to start running the NFS or does it start automatically during boot?

also is it recommended that I fix the IP address of the server so i don't have to type 192.168.15.whatever every time the client wants to mount /work(IP address currently handed down by DHCP server ran by a Linksys router). i did try this but then the server cannot connect to the Internet for some reason do i need to do anything after i fix the address (maybe reset the router just thought about that).

thanks!!

on the server i just typed

service nfs start

and it came back with everything ok except idmap which failed could this be why the clients report the server is down??

help is much appreciated, thanks!

First of all, a server should never, ever have a dynamic IP address. Make it static. Secondly, why not use Samba? Mount a "work" directory and give users rights through Samba to that directory.

Thank you WorldBuilder. I thought Samba was mostly just to enable Windows machines to see Linux machines and also it seems like a whole lot to take for a newbie so i thought i would try something seemingly simple like enabling nfs first apparently simple is not simple enough...

in all my previous employers (where they have full-time smart people to fuss over this) we would put all our files in a directory called '/projects' or something similar, which was located in a server somewhere, when my machine booted it automatically mounted this location.

i fixed the ip per your advice but i still get the same error when i type the mount command

Well, I am no NFS expert, but I don't even think you can do this with free software. Check out http://www.silug.org/lists/silug-dis.../msg00007.html for some more info.

I only use Samba to allow my Windows clients to see my Samba-shared directories. Honestly, I've never tried to see a Windows box FROM linux, and have no idea how to do that part...

Perhaps someone else?

Chris