Ok so i'm hoping you have heard this all before.

Firstly I'm a student that has to learn php and mysql quickly. So i thought i would try out redhat 9 . ( binary edition using graphical)

I have three pc's and a router.
I have set up as follows

two oldest pcs on windows xp. (unis like to use word etc!) and i'm familar with xp they connect to broadband through router and are fine. can see each other and share files etc.

They can also see my samba server. Samba can access shared docs but xp machines cannot access samba. server not allowing incoming requests.
Samba has internet access.
i have tried going through gnome menu to security settings, but my book tells me i should be able to put in the ports i need and tells me what they are but there is nowhere to do it. i'm confused

also any guidance on how to make a xerox workcentre m950 work with linux?

it reconigses the model when i try, but then i have to choose a different model because its not in the list so i'm guessing i need a new driver and i cant find one. I want to set this up so that all machines can just print to it.

Same with my cd rw. how do i set that up so it can be shared?

and my dvd?

sorry lots of questions but even just a clue would help !

cheers

kevin

for samba you should have ports 137, 138, 139, and 445 open, meaning that these ports are NOT blocked by your redhat firewall...

re samba not working... have you created samba (not unix) users that correspond with/ have the same username and password as your windows boxes? In other words, if you are logging on to your xp boxes as administrator with the password "test", you must have a samba user named administrator and the password must be set to "test".... or you should enable (not enabled by default) guest access if you dont have any security concerns... if you have no clue what Im talking about with regard to the samba users, please read up on a tutorial or two re smb... pretty imp concept you will need to know...

check out webmin (www.webmin.com) to help with the samba configuration... I found that it greatly simplified the setup, and covered a lot of areas that S.W.A.T. didnt...

also http://www.linuxprinting.org is the place to go to find the drivers you need for your multifuntion device...

Thanks, webmin looks very useful, i'm checking it out now

thanks again

webmin is dope....

notice that webmin has utils for "edit samba users" and "convert unix users to samba users" etc.... SWAT doesnt even touch that whole area of smb setup, which I had a hard time with.

good luck - post back up here if still have any snags.