Shared files - problems

Even though I have my network of three desks and a laptop shared to a standstill, I still have trouble accessing files and folders between machines.

Like, right now I'm sitting up in bed with my laptop trying to access some files on my main machine's C drive. The main pc's C drive is fully shared, as are all the drives on all the linked computers (Yes, allow people to access and change files to their heart's content), but I might as well have saved my efforts, as I can rarely get anything of importance to move from pc to pc. (It's quicker to walk from room to room carrying the files on a plate)

I have a hunch that this problem is linked to an arcane phenomenon called 'permissions' but I know less about this thing than I do about the inside of my colon.

Can some kind person enlighten me, please?

 

I've moved this thread from the XP forum, as I think you will get a quicker answer here, as this sort of problem crops up quite a lot in the networking forum.

OK some questions to start things off:

How are you connecting to other PCs. Are you browsing via Network Neighbourhood? Can you access them by typing:

\\computername

in the Windows Explorer address bar?

 

Hi ReggieB. Thanks for your response.

Generally I link to the other computers through Network Neighbourhood. On every computer I build or service I reconfigure XP to Classic appearance and dump the address bar, so I never use that avenue.

Via NN, I can always access the other computer's C drives - it's just that when I drill down a few levels, say to access the Favorites folder, I get blocked. Not that I want to access these areas too often - all I do mostly is to move data folders around between units.

But I need to understand this 'permissions' thing. I can't get to grips with the fact that I can enable an entire drive for sharing and still be unable to access all areas of it. Advice would be appreciated :--))

 

OK. To start with I should state that sharing a complete drive, particularly the system drive, is bad practice. You are making it much easier for trojans on your network to spread around all the PCs. I would strongly recommend that you share your document and data folders only.

Sharing is made a little more complicated because there are two levels of permission: the share permissions and the file permissions. When you set up a share you are often prompted to set up the permissions for the share. These share permissions only control the point at which you can connect into this file system. That is they determine which users can remotely connect into the file system at this point.

Once connected via a share, the user has the same permissions as they would have if they were logged into the computer directly. So, much as user1 can be blocked from accessing folders reserved for user2 when user 1 logs into the computer directly, users1 will also be prevented from access those files when logging on remotely. This is done with file permissions.

So if you want to remotely access files on another PC you must first ensure that you have share permissions to make the connection and then make sure the file permissions are set to allow your user account access to the files.

File permissions cascade downwards. This allows you to set the permissions at the folder level, and then all files and subfolders in that folder can inherit those permissions. So on the folder you are having problems accessing, you need to right click on it, select properties, and go to the Permissions tab (do this from the PC you are trying to connect to - it is unlikely that you will be able to do this easily remotely). There you will be able to add the user account for the remote user and assign them the permissions they need to access the files.

 

Thanks for the explanation, ReggieB. I need to think about this business so I'll print out your tips and work on them.

Cheers!