I was trying file sharing with samba on my desktop running fedora 2. Client running xp. so must have spend 6 hours trying to make it work still not working. in beginning, i couldn't access the share (though i could see the samba server i.e the fedora machine). then i could see the share but it was very very slow and even then i couldn't save file. i have made sure the user has the same windows and linux user account credentials and read/write access is on. both are on same workgroup, i can ping each other (coulf not access each other via name but then added entries into /etc/host on linux and host file on windows and now can access via name) any experts samba users, pls get in touch. why samba share has caused me so much time and still not right. i even bought a expensive Fedora linux book and followed instructions. simon

run SWAT. To do this open a terminal and issue commands chkconfig swat on service xinetd restart then open your browser (eg firefox ..) http://localhost:901 this will open swat, enter root user name and password to access all features. (from then on you only need to open the browser and go to the URL in order to get SWAT) this program allows you to set up samba and see the effects on the config files. the thing that seems to get my XP box to talk to the Linux box is starting the winbindd service. You can do this by clicking the status icon... the other requirement is creating a samba user(systems settings.samba.preferences.) on the linux box with the same name as your linux user signon and giving it a Windows login name and a fresh password. create your linux share(use swat for this) somewhere on the linux user's home directory.. ensure the guest ok parameter is yes. commit changes. Next GLOBALS icon...set security to USER.. and check the other parameters are correct. eg. GUEST account set to 'nobody' USERNAME MAP set to '/etc/samba/smbusers' when the share appears on the xp box and you click it it will ask for user and password. use the 'windows ' name and password you set up on samba... voila.. it works use the Help links in SWAT if in doubt. I spent many hours trying to read and write to shares from XP until I discovered this through a Library book only this week!., the Linux Troubleshooting Bible. Good Luck... zimmer

Really appreciate your feedback, first of all. must say I have not got swat going as yet. in fact when i entered swat adddress on browser, swat didn't show up. And when i ran cmd to show all packages installed for swat, couldn't see any. also looked in add/remove apps but swat not listed as package. surprisingly, according to fedora 2 book i have swat should load up from browser. also do i have to restart smb and xinetd everytime if i make a change. also i have not come across winbindd service before. simon

it is listed as samba-swat by my Red Carpet RPM package controller at version 0.3xxxx same as the main samba packages . as for starting and restarting... I issued these commands in a terminal session: chkconfig swat on ***this ensures SWAT will be available in future reboots and service xinetd restart *** this restarts the service that SWAT needs so you don't have to reboot to start using SWAT for the first time I have not used the terminal since then. SWAT has appeared in the browser as advertised :) using http:/localhost:901 As I said, the 3 samba related sevices can be started or stopped if required in the SWAT interface rather than going to a terminal session . Clicking on the status icon in the SWAT interface will tell you which of the 3 services are running and which are not. winbindd is not set to start at boot up, so you have to go and start it from swat (or maybe if you cannot get swat, start it from the terminal service winbind start (please note the command spelling has only ONE d) and see if that helps your WinXP logins) . I recommend you get SWAT running, even if you have to go chase around to install it. But I am of the opinion it is there and all you need to do is breathe life into it as I have explained. Best Regards Zimmer