Steve Winograd said:
"spamlet" said:
Steve Winograd said:
I expect this sounds like a daft question, but it has had me puzzled for
some time after I began experimenting with file sharing and a new home
network.
Setting up a network via a router, between laptop and pc, I found that
the
pc had access to the laptop's shared folder but the laptop could not
access
files on the pc. [pc runs XP Pro: laptop XP Home.]
Experimenting with the permissions via the security tab on the pc's
folder,
I found that I could only specify users on the pc. No provision seems to
have been made to give a permission to a user on another m/c.
The only way I could get around this was to add 'everyone' to the
permissions, which seemed a pretty dumb way to achieve the desired
share.
Eventually I went back to square one, and ran the network set up wizard
on
both machines again, and indeed both could then see the other's shared
folder. However, on checking the permissions, I find that the wizard
too
has achieved this by simply adding 'everyone' to the permissions list!
How can I get around this and specify only particular users of a second
machine to be able to access the first, when there seems to be no way to
enter details of another m/c in either the permissions or the map drive
dialogues?
Apologies, but to a newbie on the subject, this all seems rather counter
intuitive compared with other Windows functions/facilities.
Grateful to anyone who can explain this for me.
Cheers,
S
Create matching user accounts (same user name and password) on both
computers. Permissions that you assign to a local account on the PC
also apply to the matching user account on the laptop.
"Everyone" doesn't mean that all users are allowed access. It means
that all users who have accounts on the PC are allowed access.
Ron Lowe and I have written a web page with full details:
Windows XP Professional File Sharing
http://www.practicallynetworked.com/sharing/xp_filesharing/index.htm
Thanks for the prompt reply Steve.
I will be very interested to read your web page, but right now I have to
hand the pc over to no1 user, so I'll get back to you later.
Cheers.
S
You're welcome. Our web page has examples of how to set up users and
give permissions to specific users and groups of users. If you have
any questions after looking at it, I'll do my best to answer.
--
Best Wishes,
Steve Winograd, MS-MVP (Windows Networking)
Please post any reply as a follow-up message in the news group
for everyone to see. I'm sorry, but I don't answer questions
addressed directly to me in E-mail or news groups.
Microsoft Most Valuable Professional Program
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com
Hi Steve Winograd,
Hope people are still watching this thread as it might be of use to others.
First off, thanks very much for your xp_filesharing/ article, which has
cleared up a lot of the confusion I had over file sharing and permissions,
and I have, at last been able to suss my networking problem.
To recap: I have one laptop running XPHome and a pc running XPPro and am
networking them via a router.
Following the advice to set up identical accounts on each machine, I was
able to get myself linked up as required, but was still getting the second
user rejected by the pc (thanks very much for explaining the difference
between sharing permissions and NTFS permissions, as I had not noticed these
were two different sets of 'gatekeepers'!).
To get to the point: I discovered that when you change the name of an
account via User Accounts in XPHome's Control Panel, it ONLY changes the
'full name' of the account, which is NOT the one used by the security
settings. BUT because XPHome does not have a 'Local Users and Groups'
section in Computer Management, there is no straightforward way for Home
users to detect the problem! It has taken me all week to notice the
significance of various greyed out references to the old user name which I
had thought was changed, and to search for an equivalent of 'Local Users and
Groups'.
Eventually I tracked down references to use 'Run: control userpasswords2' in
XPHome, which at last lets one get at the REAL user name, which one can then
change as in the XPPro version. What a pain for Home users to be so
completely shafted by their misleading Control/User Accounts section. This
should come with a warning in caps that the account name cannot really be
changed from there!
Thus I think it would be very useful for you to amend your excellent 'WinXP
Pro File Sharing' piece, to add the note under the 'explore user accounts in
the raw' and 'Create User Groups' sections, that XPHome does not have the
'Local Users and Groups' section, and so to really be sure of the name of
your account you have to use controluserpasswords2, where you will also see
what groups each user is a part of. I suspect that this may account for a
lot of other peoples' problems when trying to set up home networks.
Another point that you might like to include is a caveat about the default
setting of 'Use Simple File Sharing' and the way this is kept in a silly
place right at the bottom of the 'View' menu, as if it was just a simple
formatting option rather than a serious security setting with enormously
wide implications!
For example, when we got our pc, we had no idea that there were any such
things as 'security' tabs, as 'simple' file sharing deprives you of even a
greyed out hint of their existence. As a result, when our HP printer came
with permissions set for 'Administrators and Power Users' only, not even HP
could understand why mere 'Users' of our pc could not print (their help
staff had no idea the printers came set that way); and even when we had
heard about permissions, we could not find where on earth the permissions
could be set. It took months to suss that problem and all because of one
stupid tick box default setting effectively hiding much of the vital working
controls of the system! SFS should come with a loud 'do not use' warning!
Anyhow, hope this may help others with similar problems, and possibly help
you in your own advisory capacity.
Thanks once again,
S
