Ubuntu samba connect to windows share

The samba package is a meta-package intended to be installed on file and printer sharing servers. Clients do not need this meta-package (you are acting as a client if you need to access files on another computer). For example, installing samba is not necessary if you only need your Ubuntu system to do any of the following:

• Access shared folders, drives and printers on a Windows computer (that is, act as a client with Windows servers). To do this, you only need the smbfs plugin. See MountWindowsSharesPermanently for more information.
• Have your Windows computer use (via a network) a printer that is attached to a Linux computer. CUPS can be configured to make the printer accessible to the network.

• Share directories between two Linux computers. You can use NFS or setup an SSH server on one computer and access it from other computers using an scp or sftp client, or Places -> Connect to Server… and choose «SSH» as the service type.

Ubuntu Clients

Ubuntu and Gnome make it easy to access files on a Windows network share. Open the Places Menu, then click on Network. You will see a Windows network icon. Double-click to open it. The next window shows all the domains/workgroups found on your network. Inside each domain/workgroup you will see all the computers on the domain/workgroup with sharing enabled. Double-click on a computer icon to access its shares and files.

• If you want to be able to share folders with nautilus (the file browser), install the nautilus-share package (installed by default in Ubuntu 9.10 Desktop edition):

sudo apt-get install nautilus-share

Alternate: From the menu at the top select «Location» -> «Connect to a server». In the «Service type» pull down select «Windows share». Enter the server ip address in the «Server:» box and the share name in the «Share:» box. Click «Connect» and then «Connect» again on the second dialog box

Alternate 12.04: Double clicking on ‘Windows network’ did not work for me. So I went to ‘Go’ menu in the nautilus file browser and clicked ‘Location’. I got an address bar at the top of the window. I entered «smb://192.168.2.148» (substitute the IP address of your Samba server) — I was presented with user/password window — After typing in user/passwd I was able to see the samba shares on the server and browse the files/folders.

Note: The default installation of Samba does not synchronize passwords. You may have to run «smbpasswd» for each user that needs to have access to his Ubuntu home directory from Microsoft Windows.

Windows Clients (XP,Server,Vista, Win7)

Microsoft Windows clients connect and browse through their corresponding network interface.

Example: XP clients can open Windows Network Neighborhood or My Network Places to browse available SMB shares.

Samba Client — Manual Configuration

This section covers how to manually configure and connect to a SMB file server from an Ubuntu client. smbclient is a command line tool similar to a ftp connection while smbfs allows you to mount a SMB file share. Once a SMB share is mounted it acts similar to a local hard drive (you can access the SMB share with your file browser (nautilus, konqueror, thunar, other).

Connecting to a Samba File Server from the command line

Connecting from the command line is similar to a ftp connection.

List public SMB shares with

smbclient -L //server -U user

Connect to a SMB share with

smbclient //server/share -U user

Enter you user password.

You can connect directly with

smbclient //server/share -U user%password

but your password will show on the screen (less secure).

Once connected you will get a prompt that looks like this :

smb: >

Type «help» , without quotes, at the prompt for a list of available commands.

Connecting using CIFS

CIFS is included in the smbfs package and is a replacement for smbfs (I know, the terminology here is a little confusing).

Reference : http://linux-cifs.samba.org/

As above, install by any method, smbfs, on Ubuntu 12.10, smbfs has been replaced by cifs-utils.

Allow non-root users to mount SMB shares

By default only root may mount SMB shares on the command line. To allow non-root users to mount SMB shares you could set the SUID, but I advise you configure sudo. You should configure sudo with visudo

You may either allow the group «users» to mount SMB shares, or add a group, samba, and add users you wish to allow to mount SMB shares to the samba group.

sudo groupadd samba
sudo adduser user samba

Change «user» to the username you wish to add to the samba group.

sudo visudo

In the «group» section add your group you wish to allow to mount SMB shares

Add a line  in the "group" section :
## Members of the admin group may gain root privileges
%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
%samba   ALL=(ALL) /bin/mount,/bin/umount,/sbin/mount.cifs,/sbin/umount.cifs

Change «%samba» to «%users» if you wish to allow members of the users group to mount SMB shares.

The following will mount the myshare folder on myserver to ~/mnt (it will be in your home directory):

mkdir ~/mnt
sudo mount -t cifs //myserver_ip_address/myshare ~/mnt -o username=samb_user,noexec

Note: «samba_user» = the user name on the samba server (may be different from your log-in name on the client).

The «noexec» option prevents executable scripts running from the SMB share.

You will be asked for BOTH your sudo and then your samba_user password.

To umount,

sudo umount ~/mnt

Automagically mount SMB shares

In order to have a share mounted automatically every time you reboot, you need to do the following:

With any editor, create a file containing your Windows/Samba user account details:

gksu gedit /etc/samba/user

KDE users must use kdesu rather than gksu and instead of Gedit they can use Kwrite as editor.

… it should contain two lines as follows:

username=samba_user
password=samba_user_password

Note: «samba_user» = the user name on the samba server (may be different from your log-in name on the client). «samba_user_password» is the password you assigned to the samba_user on the samba server.

Save the file and exit gedit.

Change the permissions on the file for security:

sudo chmod 0400 /etc/samba/user # permissions of 0400 = read only

Now create a directory where you want to mount your share (e.g. /media/samba_share):

sudo mkdir /media/samba_share

Now, using any editor, and add a line to /etc/fstab for your SMB share as follows:

sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.bak
gksu gedit /etc/fstab

Add a line for your SMB share:

//myserver_ip_address/myshare  /media/samba_share  cifs  credentials=/etc/samba/user,noexec  0 0

The share will mount automatically when you boot. The «noexec» option prevents executable scripts running from the SMB share.

To mount the share now, without rebooting,

sudo mount /media/samba_share

You can unmount the share with :

sudo umount /media/samba_share

If you wish to increase security at the expense of convenience, use this line in /etc/fstab

//myserver_ip_address/myshare  /media/samba_share  cifs  noauto,credentials=/etc/samba/user,noexec  0 0

The noexec» option prevents executable scripts running from the SMB share.

Edit /etc/samba/user, remove the password (leave just the samba user).

Now the share will NOT automatically mount when you boot and you will be asked for your samba password.

Mount the share with :

sudo mount /media/samba_share

CIFS may cause a shutdown error.

CIFS VFS: Server not responding.

There is a fix in the troubleshooting section of this forum post.

Back to top

Connecting using SMBFS (deprecated)

Note: This method still works, but as outlined under the «CIFS» section above is «deprecated» (no longer maintained and pending removal from the kernel).

Mounting a share on the local filesystem allows you to work around programs that do not yet use GnomeVFS to browse remote shares transparently. To mount a SMB share, first install smbfs:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install smbfs

To allow non root accounts to mount shares, change the permissions on the smbmnt program thus:

sudo chmod u+s /usr/bin/smbmnt /usr/bin/smbumount

---

Note: This may be a security risk as after setting the SUID bit anyone can mount a SMB share. I advise you configure sudo, as above.

The working line in /etc/sudoers is as follows (see CIFS section above):

%samba   ALL=(ALL) /bin/mount,/bin/umount,/sbin/mount.cifs,/sbin/umount.cifs,/usr/bin/smbmount,/usr/bin/smbumount

This allows any user in the samba group to mount SMB shares (you will need to create a samba group and add users).

The following will mount the myshare folder on myserver to ~/mnt (it will be in your home directory):

---

mkdir ~/mnt
smbmount //myserver/myshare ~/mnt

To umount,

smbumount ~/mnt

In order to have a share mounted automatically every time you reboot, you need to do the following:

Open a shell as root

sudo -s

Create a file containing your Windows/Samba user account details:

vi /etc/samba/user

…it should contain two lines as follows:

username=george
password=secret

Change the permissions on the file for security:

chmod 0600 /etc/samba/user

Now create a directory where you want to mount your share (e.g. /mnt/data):

mkdir /mnt/data

Now edit the file system table (/etc/fstab) and add a line as follows:

//server/share   /mnt/data   smbfs   credentials=/etc/samba/user,rw,uid=bob   0   0

…where ‘bob’ is the non-root user you log into ubuntu with, ‘server’ is the name or address of the Windows machine and ‘share’ is the name of the share.

To mount the share now, just use the following command as root. It will mount automatically on subsequent reboots.

mount /mnt/data

to be continued…

Ubuntu Client

On the Ubuntu client using the menu at the top, go to «Places» -> «Network». You will see an icon «Windows network» and should be able to browse to your shared folder. You will be asked for a password, leave it blank. Click the «Connect button.

(no need for a password).

If you would like to mount your SMB share using your (server) hostname rather than the IP Address, edit /etc/hosts and add your samba server (syntax IP Address hostname).

192.168.1.100    hostname

Where «hostname» = the name of your samba server.

Windows Client

On Windows open «My Computer» and navigate to «My Network Places». Navigate to your Ubuntu server and your share will be available without a password.

Alternate : From the menu at the top select «Tools» -> «Map Network Drive». Select an available letter for your SMB share (Default is z: ). In the «Folder:» box enter \samba_server_ipaddressshare. Tic (Select with the mouse) the option «Reconnect at login» if you want the share to be automatically mounted when you boot Windows. Click the «Finish» box. A dialog box will appear, enter your samba user name and password. Click «OK».

If you would like to mount your SMB share using your (server) hostname rather than the IP Address, edit C:WINDOWSsystem32driversetchosts and add your samba server (syntax IP Address hostname).

192.168.1.100    hostname

Where «hostname» = the name of your samba server.

In my previous article, Interoperability: Getting started with Samba, I covered installing and configuring Samba shares on a Linux server. The real power of Samba comes when Windows clients can communicate with Linux file servers. In this article, I will cover how you can access Samba shares from both Linux and Windows clients.

Install the Samba client packages

To access Samba share from Linux clients we need to install a few Samba client packages.

On the client machine, install the samba-common and samba-client packages.

# yum install samba-client samba-common  -y

Check for available shares

Let’s check if we can access our shares from the server. We can use either the hostname or ip address of the server. If you use the hostname, make sure DNS is working.

# smbclient -U user -L 192.168.1.122

Enter SAMBAuser's password:

        Sharename       Type      Comment
        ---------       ----      -------
        print$          Disk      Printer Drivers
        myshare         Disk      my share
        IPC$            IPC       IPC Service (Samba 4.9.1)
        user      Disk      Home Directories

Reconnecting with SMB1 for workgroup listing.

        Server               Comment
        ---------            -------

        Workgroup            Master
        ---------            -------
        SAMBA                SAMBA-SERVER

Create a directory that we can use as our mount point. I’m going to create a directory under /mnt, but you can use any directory you would like to. You may need to configure SELinux on that directory.

# mkdir /mnt/myshare

Now, mount the share.

# mount -t cifs -o username=user //192.168.1.122/myshare /mnt/share

Password for user@//192.168.1.122/myshare:  ********

Now that we’ve mounted our share, we can check the mounts with the following command:

# df -h

Persistent mount

Let’s make that directory mount persistently so it can withstand a reboot. Using the text editor of your choice, edit the /etc/fstab file. You can do this in multiple ways, but I’m going to demonstrate two ways to mount the Samba share at boot in /etc/fstab.

# vim /etc/fstab

The first option provides a username and password for the Samba user in the fstab.

//192.168.1.122/myshare /mnt/share cifs username=user,password=password,_netdev 0  0

The other option is to create a credential file. You can call this file anything, but I would like to call it cred. I would like to place credentials files in the home directory of the user. In our demonstration it will be /home/user/.cred.

//192.168.1.122/myshare /mnt/share cifs credentials=/home/user/.cred,_netdev 0 0

The _netdev option is important since we are mounting a network device. Clients may hang during the boot process if the system encounters any difficulties with the network.

Now create that .cred file inside the user’s home directory.

# vim /home/user/.cred

Next, add the Samba user’s username and password.

username=user
password=password

Finally, mount all filesystems.

# mount -a

Access a share from a Windows client

I will be using Windows 10 as my client machine with a workgroup called SAMBA. We need to create a local user account on the Windows machine that matches the username and password of the Samba user account we created in my previous article. Although account creation is not necessary, this will make things simpler when accessing the share.

Like I mentioned above, this step is optional and you can skip it completely. Although there are multiple approaches to adding a new local user on a Windows machine, for the simplicity of this article I will be using PowerShell. Launch PowerShell as an administrator and issue following commands:

PS > $password = Read-Host -AsSecureString
PS > New-LocalUser -Name “user” -Password $password

Now that we have created a new local user account matching the Samba user account, we can log in to Windows with our newly created user account.

Access a share from Windows Explorer

To access the Samba share from Windows Explorer, start typing the IP address to our share in the search area. I am using the hostname of the Samba server. In my case, it is centos. You can also access the share by using the IP address of the Samba server.

You might be prompted to enter the username and password to access the share if you skipped the local user creation process. If you get prompted for credentials, enter the Samba username and password we created in the previous article.

You will need to enter the Samba share path every time you want to access the share. There is a better way to access the share by mapping a drive to Samba share in Windows.

Mapping a drive to a Samba share

To map a drive to the Samba share, open PowerShell and issue following command:

PS > NET USE M: \centosmyshare

Wrap up

Accessing a Samba share on Linux and Windows is easy. With this basic setup, you will be able to access file shares from client machines in your network. With somewhat more configuration, you can deploy Samba shares in a domain environment. Samba can do more than file share. If you would like to learn more about Samba, read this article about Windows and Linux interoperability. This is a basic set up, but you can do so much more with Samba.

[ Want to test your sysadmin skills? Take a skills assessment today. ]

Обновлено: 30.01.2022
Опубликовано: 13.03.2021

Используемые термины: Samba, Ubuntu, SMB.

Samba позволяет настроить файловое хранилище различных масштабов — от малых офисов для крупных организаций. В данной инструкции мы рассмотрим процесс настройки файлового сервера. Сначала мы выполним установку и базовую настройку с предоставлением гостевого доступа. После будет приведены примеры разграничения доступа по пользователям, группам и пользователям Active Directory.

Подготовка сервера

1. Время

Для корректного отображения дат, необходимо позаботиться о синхронизации времени. Для этого будем использовать демон chrony. Установим его:

apt-get install chrony

Разрешим автозапуск сервиса:

systemctl enable chrony

2. Брандмауэр

По умолчанию, в системах на базе Debian брандмауэр разрешает все соединения. Но если в нашем случае мы используем брандмауэр, необходимо открыть порты:

iptables -I INPUT -p tcp —dport 445 -j ACCEPT

iptables -I INPUT -p udp —dport 137:138 -j ACCEPT

iptables -I INPUT -p tcp —dport 139 -j ACCEPT

* где порт 445 используется для samba, а порты 137, 138 и 139 — для работы NetBIOS (использование имени компьютера для доступа).

Применяем настройки:

apt-get install iptables-persistent

netfilter-persistent save

Установка и запуск Samba

Установка выполняется из репозитория одной командой:

apt-get install samba

Разрешаем автостарт сервиса:

systemctl enable smbd

И проверим, что сервис запустился: 

systemctl status smbd

Проверяем, что сервер самба позволяет к себе подключиться. Для этого можно с компьютера обратиться к серверу по SMB, например, на компьютере с Windows это можно сделать из проводника, прописав путь к серверу с двух слэшей:

* в данном примере мы подключаемся к серверу Samba с IP-адресом 192.168.1.15.

Если мы настроили сервер правильно, система откроет пустую папку. На данном этапе проверка закончена и мы можем переходить к созданию первой шары.

Разберем самый простой пример предоставления доступа к папке — анонимный доступ всем пользователям без запроса пароля.

Открываем на редактирование конфигурационный файл samba:

vi /etc/samba/smb.conf

И добавляем настройку для общей папки:

[Общая папка]
    comment = Public Folder
    path = /data/public
    public = yes
    writable = yes
    read only = no
    guest ok = yes
    create mask = 0777
    directory mask = 0777
    force create mode = 0777
    force directory mode = 0777

Создаем каталог на сервере и назначим права:

mkdir -p /data/public

chmod 777 /data/public

Применяем настройки samba, перезагрузив сервис:

systemctl restart smbd

Пробуем подключиться к папке. Мы должны зайти в нее без необходимости ввода логина и пароля.

Теперь создадим каталог, в который вход будет разрешен только авторизованным пользователям.

Открываем конфигурационный файл samba:

vi /etc/samba/smb.conf

Добавляем настройку для новой папки:

[Папка сотрудников]
    comment = Staff Folder
    path = /data/staff
    public = no
    writable = yes
    read only = no
    guest ok = no
    create mask = 0777
    directory mask = 0777
    force create mode = 0777
    force directory mode = 0777

Создаем каталог для новой папки:

mkdir /data/staff

Задаем права на созданный каталог:

chmod 777 /data/staff

Создаем пользователя в системе Linux:

useradd staff1

* где staff1 — имя пользователя.

Задаем пароль для пользователя:

passwd staff1

Теперь создадим пользователя в samba:

smbpasswd -a staff1

Перезапускаем samba:

systemctl restart smbd

Пробуем зайти на сервер — общую папку мы должны открыть без авторизации, а при попытке открыть папку сотрудников должно появиться окно ввода логина и пароля.

Если мы авторизованы на компьютере, с которого пытаемся подключиться к серверу, под той же учетной записью, что создали для доступа к папке, samba может и не потребовать аутентификации.

Теперь создадим папку, доступ к которой будут иметь ограниченное количество пользователей.

Открываем конфигурационный файл samba:

vi /etc/samba/smb.conf

Добавляем настройку для новой папки:

[Приватная папка]
    comment = Private Folder
    path = /data/private
    public = no
    writable = no
    read only = yes
    guest ok = no
    valid users = admin, staff2, staff3, @privateusers
    write list = admin, staff2
    create mask = 0777
    directory mask = 0777
    force create mode = 0777
    force directory mode = 0777
    inherit owner = yes

Создаем каталог для новой папки:

mkdir /data/private

Задаем права на созданный каталог:

chmod 777 /data/private

Для применения настроек перезапускаем samba:

systemctl restart smbd

Создать группу пользователей можно командой:

groupadd privateusers

Добавить ранее созданного пользователя в эту группу:

usermod -a -G privateusers staff1

Подробнее о работе с учетными записями в Linux.

Проверяем возможность работы с новым каталогом.

Сетевая корзина

При удалении файлов из общей папки, данные удаляются навсегда. Но мы можем настроить сетевую корзину — скрытый каталог, в который будут перемещаться удаляемые с самбы объекты.

Открываем конфигурационный файл:

vi /etc/samba/smb.conf

Создаем шару:

[Recycle]
    comment = Snap Directories
    path = /data/recycle
    public = yes
    browseable = yes
    writable = yes
    vfs objects = recycle
    recycle:repository = .recycle/%U
    recycle:keeptree = Yes
    recycle:touch = Yes
    recycle:versions = Yes
    recycle:maxsize = 0
    recycle:exclude = *.tmp, ~$*
    recycle:exclude_dir = /tmp

Создаем каталог и задаем права:

mkdir /data/recycle

chmod 777 /data/recycle

Перезапускаем самбу:

systemctl restart smbd

Пробуем зайти в сетевой каталог Recycle и создать, а после удалить файл. Он должен оказаться к скрытой папке .recycle.

Для автоматической чистки сетевой корзины можно создать скрипт:

mkdir /scripts

vi /scripts/cleanrecycle.sh

* в данном скрипте мы ищем все файлы в каталоге /data/recycle/.recycle, которые старше 30 дней и удаляем их.

Разрешаем запуск скрипта:

chmod +x /scripts/cleanrecycle.sh

Создаем задание в планировщике:

crontab -e

0 5 * * * /scripts/cleanrecycle.sh

* в данном примере мы будем запускать скрипт по очистке сетевой корзины каждый день в 05:00.

Подключение к шаре

Теперь разберем примеры подключения к нашим шарам из разных систем.

Windows

Для разового подключения можно использовать проводник, прописав в нем адрес сервера через косые линии:

Для подключения сетевого диска, который будет автоматически создаваться при запуске системы, в проводнике сверху нажимаем Простой доступ — Подключить как диск:

В открывшемся окне прописываем путь до сетевой папки и выбираем имя диска:

Сетевой диск настроен.

Но мы может сделать те же действия из командной строки:

net use x: \samba.dmosk.localAD ACL /persistent:yes

* где x: — имя сетевого диска; \samba.dmosk.localAD ACL — путь до сетевого каталога; persistent:yes — указывает на то, что нужно восстанавливать данный диск каждый раз при входе в систему.

Linux

Монтирование

В Linux мы можем монтировать удаленный каталог с помощью команды mount, например:

mount -t cifs «//192.168.1.15/ad» /mnt -o user=dmosk

* где 192.168.1.15 — IP-адрес сервера; mnt — каталог, куда монтируем сетевую шару; dmosk — пользователь, под которым выполняем подключение к сетевому каталогу.
** в систему должен быть установлен пакет cifs-utils.

Подробнее, процесс монтирования описан в инструкции Как в Linux монтировать шару CIFS.

SMB Browser

Также мы можем увидеть содержимое удаленных папок на samba при помощи клиента smb. Для начала установим данного клиента:

а) на Red Hat / CentOS / Fedora:

yum install samba-client

б) на Debian / Ubuntu / Mint:

apt-get install samba-client

После вводим команду:

smbclient -L 192.168.1.15 -U staff@dmosk.local

* где 192.168.1.15 — сервер samba, к которому мы пытаемся подключиться; staff@dmosk.local — учетная запись, под которой выполняется подключение.

… мы получим список каталогов, которые расшарены на сервере.

Также мы можем подключиться к конкретной папке, например:

smbclient \\192.168.1.15\ad -U staff@dmosk.local

Мы подключимся клиентом samba — можно выполнить запрос на показ содержимого:

smb: > ls

Или полный список возможных команд:

smb: > help

Некоторые опции Samba

Рассмотрим некоторые полезные опции, которые могут пригодится при настройке Samba.

1. hosts allow

Параметр задает список разрешенных хостов или сетей, с которых можно подключаться к серверу. Если его прописать в секцию с настройкой шары, то он будет действовать только для нее, если прописать в [global], то для всех общих папок.

Пример использования параметра.

hosts allow = comp1, 192.168.1., 192.168.160.0/255.255.252.0

* в нашем примере мы разрешим доступ только для компьютера comp1, компьютеров из сетей 192.168.1.0/24 и 192.168.160.0/22.

2. hosts deny

Параметр аналогичный hosts allow, только он наоборот — запрещает доступ для хостов и сетей. Например:

hosts deny = comp2, 192.168.2., 192.168.164.0/255.255.252.0

hosts deny = ALL EXCEPT 192.168.3.

3. interfaces

По умолчанию samba использует все сетевые интерфейсы, кроме локальной петли (127.0.0.1). Параметр interfaces позволит указать, на каком сетевом адаптере файловый сервер должен принимать запросы. Пример:

interfaces = ens32 192.168.1.15/24 192.168.2.15/255.255.255.0

4. Force User/Group

Опции force user и force group позволяют задать пользователя и группу, от которых будет работать подключение пользователя к samba. Параметр может оказаться полезным для создания шары из каталога с уже назначенным владельцем, которого мы не хотим менять.

Прописывается для шары:

force user = apache
force group = apache

* данная настройка позволит подключаться к шаре под пользователем apache.

5. Include

Позволяет подключить дополнительный файл с конфигурацией.

include = /etc/samba/conf.d/shares.conf

* данная опция будет дополнительно подключать конфигурацию из файла /etc/samba/conf.d/shares.conf (прописывается полный путь).

Читайте также

Возможно, эти инструкции будут также Вам полезны:

1. Установка и настройка samba в Linux CentOS.

2. Как настроить автоматическое монтирование дисков в Linux.

3. Настройка дисковых квот в Linux.

This post shows students and new users how to connect to shares on Windows 11 from the Ubuntu desktop.

By default when you open the Ubuntu file manager, it should find network shares that are automatically advertised across the local network. Similar to Windows systems, Ubuntu uses SMB protocol to connect to Windows shares that are advertised and shared.

Remote users can connect over the network and access shared files and folders as if they were directly connected to the local machines. This is a convenient way to make files and folders available to other people on your local network.

When shares are advertised Ubuntu and other desktop computers should be able to view and connect to the shared resources.

However, if the shares are not advertised, users on the same network will have to manually connect to the shares by typing the resource network address. The steps below will show you how to do that.

Ubuntu and Windows 11 should work seamlessly when it comes to filing sharing since both will still use SMB protocol. Some things and settings have changed so much that folks will have to learn new ways of using Windows.

Despite all these new changes in Windows 11, filesharing between Windows and Ubuntu should still work.

Enable Network Discovery in Windows 11

As we mentions above, shares must be advertised for other devices to view or access them. In Windows, Network Discovery needs to be turned for advertising of shares to be viewed from other devices.

If your Windows devices are not able to see or discover each other on your private network, it might likely be that Network Discovery is disabled.

To enable Network Discovery, continue below.

Windows 11 has a centralized location for the majority of its settings. From system configurations to creating new users and updating Windows, all can be done from its System Settings pane.

To get to System Settings, you can use the Windows key + I shortcut or click on Start ==> Settings as shown in the image below:

Alternatively, you can use the search box on the taskbar and search for Settings. Then select to open it.

Windows Settings pane should look similar to the image below. In Windows Settings, click Network & internet, then select Ethernet on the right pane of your screen shown in the image below.

In the Ethernet settings pane, under Network profile type, choose Private. This profile will allow devices in your network to be discovered. This profile should also be selected if you need file sharing or use apps that communicate over this network.

The private profile is suitable for homes, workplaces, and networks that are trusted.

If you have other networks like Wi-Fi (if you’re connected to a wireless network) or Ethernet (if you’re connected to a network using a network cable), you can also set the profile type to Private.

When you’re done, exit and network discovery should be enabled.

Turn on Public Folder Sharing in Windows 11

Use the steps below to set up file sharing.

Windows 11 has a centralized location for the majority of its settings. From system configurations to creating new users and updating Windows, all can be done from its System Settings pane.

However, changing the account username is still done in the old Control Panel. To get to Control Panel, you can click on Start and start typing Control Panel as shown in the image below:

In the Control Panel, select Network and Internet as highlighted in the image below.

On the next pane, select Network and Sharing Center as highlighted below.

Next, select Change advanced sharing settings as highlighted below.

In the Advanced sharing center, select Private (current profile) and Turn on file and printer sharing.

Save your changes and exit.

On the same Advance sharing options page, scroll down All networks.

There you should see settings for Public folder sharing, Media streaming, File sharing connections, and Password protected sharing. Windows should automatically turn on file and printer sharing in private networks. However, in some instances, this will not be enabled.

If you can not automatically find printers and shared resources in your private network, then the File sharing option may be disabled.

If you enable password-protected sharing, only people who have accounts on the local computer or in the domain environment will be able to access shared files and printers.

Make your changes and save, then exit.

The settings above can easily be done using the commands below when run as administrator.

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group="File and Printer Sharing" new enable=Yes
netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group="Network Discovery" new enable=Yes

You must open the command prompt as administrator to run the commands above.

Access shares on Windows 11 from Ubuntu

Now that Network Discovery and file sharing are enabled, you can now connect to Ubuntu and view shares on Windows devices.

To browse Windows files over the network, open the File Manager application from the Activities overview (top left corner) or click File Manager on the dock and click Other Locations in the sidebar.

If Network Discovery is enabled and file sharing enable, you should see shared files and folders in the Windows Network folder above.

If not, run the commands below to install Samba.

sudo apt update
sudo apt install samba

In the file manager, click Other Locations in the sidebar. In Connect to Server, enter the address of the server, in the form of a URL. Details on supported URLs are listed below If you have connected to the server before, you can select it from the Recent Servers list.

Then click the Connect button when you’re ready to connect.

smb://servername/Share_name

Another format with multiple shared folders:

smb://10.0.2.18/users/Richard/Documents

Windows computers use a proprietary protocol to share files over a local area network. Computers on a Windows network are sometimes grouped into domains for organization and to better control access. If you have the right permissions on the remote computer, you can connect to a Windows share from the file manager.

You should see Windows shares if you have access to them.

If accessing the shares and you’re prompted for login name and password, type in the Windows account login info. This account must have access to view the shared content.

How to access Ubuntu files from Windows

On the Ubuntu machine, we’ll want to create a folder to share with Windows systems. Run the commands below to create a folder called samba in the system root directory.

sudo mkdir /samba

After that, set the group ownership to sambashare and permission to allow members of the group to access the folder.

sudo chgrp sambashare /samba
sudo chmod 2770 /samba

After changing the folder permission to allow sharing, run the commands below to add your Ubuntu account to allow access via Samba.

Replace yourusername with your Ubuntu account.

sudo smbpasswd -a yourusername

Next, set Samba’s password and enable your Ubuntu account to access Samba shares.

sudo smbpasswd -a yourusername
sudo smbpasswd -e yourusername

Next, add your user account to the sambashare group.

sudo usermod -a -G sambashare yourusername

After that, open the Samba configuration file by running the commands below.

sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf

Then add these lines at the bottom of the file and save.

[share]
    path = /samba
    browseable = yes
    read only = no
    force create mode = 0660
    force directory mode = 2770
    valid users = @sambashare

After saving the file, restart Samba by running the commands below.

sudo systemctl restart smbd
sudo systemctl restart nmbd

At this point, you should be able to access the /samba folder on the Ubuntu system using your account. When prompted, type in your Ubuntu username and password.

That should do it!

Conclusion:

This post showed you how to enable Windows Network Discovery and enable file sharing to access shared content from Ubuntu. If you find any error above, please use the comment form below to report.

Samba is an open-source file-sharing protocol that allows us to share folders and other resources with the end-users. This article will elaborate on how to install and use Samba to share files on Ubuntu Linux distribution. We have executed all commands and set of procedures on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS system and Windows 10 in this article.

Prerequisites

You must have sudo privileges or you must log in from the root user account to install Samba on your system.

It is recommended to update your system apt packages repository before installing any new package or software. So, run the below-mentioned command to update the apt repository:

$ sudo apt update

Now, by executing the following command install Samba:

$ sudo apt install samba smbclient

To further proceed with the installation process press ‘y’ and then hit ‘Enter’. 

In a while, the installation of Samba will complete on your system.

You can check the Samba running service status by typing the following command:

$ sudo systemctl status smbd 

Now, we will enable the ‘Samba’ profile by changing the firewall access rules.

$ sudo ufw allow 'Samba'

Share folders using Samba

Once the installation of Samba is completed, now we can share folders or directories graphically by using the default Ubuntu file manager tool ‘Nautilus’.

Let’s play a demo on how to share directories through the Nautilus file manager. 

Go to the file manager and choose a folder that you want to share through your local network. Right-click on the required folder and then choose the ‘Local Network Share’ option from the displaying list items which is also red highlighted in the following image:

The following folder sharing dialog will be displayed on the system. You need to mark the following checkboxes to share the directory:

Check the ‘Share this folder’ checkbox and then, type the share name and you can also add a comment but, this is optional.

Only the owner of the share directory in the default Linux configuration can read or write to the files and directories in the Samba share.  

Click on the ‘Create Share’ button.

After that, the following dialog will appear on your system. Click on the ‘Add the permissions automatically’.

You will see that share is enabled now and ready to use. Now, close the folder sharing dialog by clicking on the cancel option.

Once you share a folder, the folder icon should be changed which is shown in the below-mentioned screenshot:

Create Samba users

If you are a guest user then, you don’t need any user account authentication to access Samba shares directories. By using guest shares, everyone can access the sharing folder on the network. But, you need a Samba user account to allow access to Samba shares as an authorized person.

Note: you should know that local Linux server accounts are linked with the Samba user accounts. So, you can keep the same name of Samba users that matched with the local Linux server user’s accounts.

For example, we are creating a Samba user named ‘kbuzdar’ by running the following command:

$ sudo smbpasswd -a kbuzdar

In the above command, the name ‘kbuzdar’ is the name of my login user on Ubuntu.

Enter the new password for a user and press ‘Enter’. Again, retype the new password and hit ‘Enter’. 

You will see on the terminal that the new Samba user is created successfully and a new password has been assigned to a newly created user.

Access Samba shares on Linux system

To access the Samba shares the Samba client program should be installed on your Ubuntu system. 

Click on the ‘other Locations’ and enter the address of Samba shares in connect to server field which is mentioned in the following screenshot:

The following dialog will appear on your system:

In the above screenshot, you have both choices either you want to connect as an ‘Anonymous’ user or as a ‘Registered user’. Type Samba user credentials and then click on the ‘Connect’ button.

Click on your server or hostname.

Here, you can see that all Samba shares directories.

Now, just click on a particular directory and enter credentials.

You can then access the Samba shares folder’s content on your system.

Access Samba shares on Windows

Windows user can also connect to the Samba shares by using the following steps:

Open the file explorer and right-click on ‘This PC’ option. The following dropdown list will open. Select ‘Add a Network Location’.

The following wizard will appear on the system. Click on Next.

Now, again click on Next to choose a custom network location.

Enter your server IP and Samba shares User name.

Enter the Samba account credentials now you can see the shares directories.

Access Samba Shares using Command Line

Create a directory that you want to share through Samba using the following syntax and assign privileges using the chown and chmod 2770 command:

$ mkdir /home/<folder-name>/<user-name>

$ mkdir /home/samba/kbuzdar

Now, enable user using the following command:

$ sudo smbpasswd -e kbuzdar

Make the copy of the smb.conf file for safety using the following command:

$ sudo cp /etc/samba/smb.conf ~

Edit the configuration file in your favorite text editor by running the following command:

$ sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf

Once the configuration file is loaded, add the following code at the end of the file:

[<folder_name>]
path = /home/<user_name>/<folder_name>
valid users = <user_name>
read only = no

Replace the user_name and folder_name with your own details.

Now, restart the samba services by using the command as mentioned below:

$ sudo service smbd restart

To test any errors in the smb.conf file, run the below-given command:

testparm

Now, using the following command you can access samba share folders:

$ sudo apt install smbclient

The following command will list all samba shares folders:

$ smbclient -L //<HOST_IP_OR_NAME>/<folder_name> -U <user>

Type the following command to connect with samba share:

$ smbclient //<HOST_IP_OR_NAME>/<folder_name> -U <user>

Conclusion

From the above article, we have learned how to install Samba in Ubuntu 20.04 Linux system. We have implemented how to share folders via a local network using Samba shares. Enjoy the benefits of Samba on your system.

If you have a network that comprises of both Windows and Linux machines and you want to enable sharing between them. You can achieve this by using a useful tool Samba. It is an open-source tool that allows you to access shared resources including files, printers, etc.

In this article, we will show you how to install and configure Samba as a file storage system for Windows and Linux OS. We will also show you how to access Samba shared files using other Linux and Windows client OS. Before accessing the shares, make sure you have the server and client OS in the same IP subnet.

For this article, I am using Ubuntu 18.04 LTS for the installation and configuration of Samba server.

Installation of Samba on Ubuntu

Launch the Terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T key combinations then enter the following command to install Samba.

$ sudo apt install samba

Verify SAMBA installation

You can verify if the Samba has successfully installed and running by entering the following command. It will show the status of the Samba service.

$ sudo systemctl status nmbd

You can see the above status that the Samba is active and running.

Configuration of Samba

Once you have down with the installation, you will need to configure it.

1. First, we will need to create a Samba directory, where all the shared data will be stored. Open the Terminal and run the following command as sudo:

$sudo mkdir /samba

It will create new subdirectory samba in the root directory.

2. Make a backup of the configuration file by copying it in the same or another directory. To copy the file, run the following command as sudo:

$ sudo cp /etc/samba/smb.conf /etc/samba/smb_backup.conf

It will make the backup file in the same directory.

3. Now edit the configuration file.The configuration file of Samba is located in /etc/samba/ in a file named smb.conf. You can use Gedit, Nano or Vim to edit any config file. To edit the file using nano editor, open Terminal and run the following command as sudo:

$ sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf

Configuring Samba Shares

Now we will configure our new directory samba as a share. For this, we will have to add the following lines in the Samba configuration file.

Add the following line to the bottom of the smb.conf file.

[samba-share]
comment = Samba on Ubuntu
path = /samba
read only = no
browsable = yes

Where

• [samba-share] = name of the share
• comment= Add a brief description of the share
• Path= It is the directory of your share.
• Read only = It specifies whether or not a user is allowed to write
• Browsable = whether the share should be listed in the share list

Press Ctrl+O to save and Ctrl+X to exit.

Setting up Samba User Account

Now, set up a user account for Samba. Samba use system account for accessing the share but it does not accept the system account password. so we will need to set up a password for that account by entering the following command as sudo. When requested for the password, Type new password.

$ sudo smbpasswd -a username

Restart Samba Service

Once you have down with all the configurations, restart the Samba service by running the following command:

$ sudo systemctl restart smbd.service

Connecting Samba Share

As previously discussed, you should be in a LAN to access files from the Samba server. That means the IP of your Samba server and the clients who are connecting to it should be in the same network.

For instance, in my scenario, I have one Samba server and two clients: one is Linux and the other is Windows. All three machines are in the same network.

• IP of Samba (Server): 192.168.36.129/24
• IP of Linux (Client): 192.168.36.130/24
• IP of Windows (Client): 192.168.36.1/24

Samba server IP configuration

You can check the IP address of any machine by running ifconfig in Terminal.

$ ifconfig

Following is the IP configuration of my Samba server:

Method 1: Connecting from Linux

There are two ways through which you can connect Samba share from Linux client.

1. Using Command Line

2. Using GUI

Following is the IP configuration of my Linux client is:

1. Using the command line

To connect Samba share through the Linux command line, you will need a smbclient tool. To install smbclient, open the Terminal run the following command as sudo:

$ sudo apt install smbclient

Once the installation is completed, run the command by using the following syntax to access Samba share.

$ sudo smbclient //[IP_address or Host_name]/share_name –U username

• [IP_address or Host_name] is the IP address or the host name of the Samba server
• [share_name] is the name of the Samba share
• [username] is the name of the user that is accessing the share

It will prompt for the password. After you enter the password, you will be logged in to Samba CLI. You can type help to see a list of various commands.

2. Using GUI

To access Samba share via GUI, open Linux File Manager. Click on Connect to Server on the left pane of the File Manager window.

In a Connect to Server window, enter the Samba server address in the following syntax and click Connect.

smb:// [IP_address or Host_name]/[share_name]

The following screen will appear. From Connect As option, select Registered User.

Enter Samba username and password. Leave the Domain as default and click Connect.

You will see the connection has established. Now you can access the files on Samba server.

Method 2: Connecting From Windows

You can connect to Samba share using Windows OS in two ways:

1. Using Run utility

2. Using File Explorer

Following is the IP configuration of My Windows client machine:

1. Using Run utility

Press Windows key + R to launch the Run utility. Enter the address in the following syntax to access Samba share and press Enter.

\[IP-address][share_name]

It will be prompted for credentials. Enter credentials for Samba share, then click OK.

You will see the connection has established. Now you can access the files on Samba server.

2. Using File Explorer

Launch File Explorer in Window. In the left pane, right click on This PC. Then select Add a network location from drop-down options.

It will launch the Add Network Location wizard. Keep clicking on Next until the following screen appears. Add Samba share address in following the syntax and click Next.

\[Ip-address]share_name

In the next screen, you can change the name of the shared location. Click Next and then click Finish to complete the process.

When the above process is completed, it will prompt for credentials, enter the credentials for Samba share and click OK.

You will see the connection has established. Now you can access the files on Samba server.

Therefore, to wrap things up, we have learned how to install and configure Samba on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS to create shares. We have learned how to connect those shares using Linux and Windows OS.

Your home network might have a few Windows machines on the ground floor, a Mac in an upstairs bedroom, a PocketPC on a nightstand, and a Linux box or two in the basement, all networked with a generic router. For all the devices in this familiar family setup, or even a scenario with thousands of users, the Samba suite is an ideal solution for file and print sharing.

Several cross-platform file and print-sharing solutions exist, but Samba and the SMB/CIFS protocol may be the easiest to implement in a home networking environment. Windows machines and Macs come with the functionality to work with with Samba out of the box, and you should only need to install a single Samba package for Linux machines. GNOME and KDE offer Samba client functionality built in to their default file managers, Nautilus and Konqueror, respectively.

We’ll focus on configuring and using Samba for file and print-sharing in a typical home network with Linux and Windows machines. You can choose from several Samba configuration GUIs, but we’ll go the old-fashioned route and point our text editors to smb.conf. The configuration file is commonly found at /etc/samba/smb.conf or /usr/local/samba/lib/smb.conf. Note that you will need to be root to edit these, or use sudo.

Samba will run on nearly any Unix-like system and can be found in the repositories of just about every Linux distribution. Begin by using your distribution’s package manager to make sure it is installed.

Configuring Samba

Samba is a very mature and complex package, so its configuration file can be long and complicated. You will have to trust that your distribution supplied you with a reasonably sound default configuration and focus on changing just a few lines in smb.conf to make sure they are appropriate for the purposes of a home network. If you want to know more about any line, consult man smb.conf.

Remember that any line in the configuration file preceded by a semicolon (;) or hash mark (#) is a comment and will not be recognized as an active setting. To activate the line, remove the semicolon or hash. It’s a good idea to add your own comments preceded by one of these characters so that you will remember the logic behind your configuration the next time you load smb.conf.

The first option to consider is Samba’s security level. This line will appear under the [global] section of smb.conf, where all Samba-wide configuration is done. The other sections, addressed later in this article, relate to specific Samba services (shared resources). The security level will most likely be set to the value user and look like this:

security = user

For a home network, you may want to consider setting this to share. The main difference is that with the user setting you will be required to log into the Samba server before you can browse its resources. This is a wise precaution on untrusted networks, but will be inconvenient when using resources you would like your entire household to have access to, such as a printer. With share enabled, you can still require users to authenticate themselves with a password to access particular resources.

While still in the [global] section, let’s move on to printers. If you use the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS) (which most distributions default to), the only thing you need to do to have Samba recognize your printers is set the following lines accordingly:


printing = cups
printcap name = cups


Since you may be configuring these printers (and perhaps other resources) to be accessible without user authentication, it is very important that you restrict access to only known and trusted hosts – the computers in your household. Consult your router’s manual for instructions on assigning specific IP addresses to each computer in your home network. Once you have a list of trusted hosts, enter them into the following lines in the [global] section:


hosts allow = computer1 computer2 computerN
hosts deny = ALL


Although you have specified that ALL hosts be denied, any host listed on the hosts allow line will still be given access. The format of the IP addresses assigned to each computer by your router will vary. For instance, if machines on your local network are given addresses of the format 192.168.0.x, the following lines will restrict Samba access to local hosts:

hosts allow = 192.168.0.
hosts deny = ALL

Note that the final digit of the IP address was left off on the hosts allow line. This specifies that any IP address in that range be allowed. For additional security against external access, look into blocking Samba ports with a firewall.

Sharing directories and printers

It’s time to move beyond [global] and configure specific shared resources. Begin with the [homes] section. By default, your distribution may have this section configured to allow users to access their home directory on the machine running the Samba server.

If you have security = share set, this feature may not work as expected and users may be presented with home directories without logging in. If you are the only one with a home directory on the machine running the Samba server anyway, which is likely in a home network environment, it is advisable to remove or comment out (using hash marks or semicolons) the [homes] section and add any useful directories as shared resources individually later on.

Now you can begin sharing specific directories. Use this as a template for a publicly shared folder for which it is not necessary for users to be authenticated:

[Share Name]
path = /location/of/directory
guest ok = yes
browseable = yes
read only = no

Share Name is whatever title you choose (to the client accessing your server, this will appear to be the name of the shared directory). The guest ok = yes line is what specifies this share as publicly accessible. The browseable = yes line will make the share appear available to all users. Set browseable = no to force users to manually type in the share name to access it. Of course, you can set read only = yes to restrict users from make changes to the directory remotely.

Use this as a template for private shares that users must enter a password to access:

[Share Name]
path = /location/of/directory
valid users = user
read only = yes
browseable = no


Here, user is the user name on the machine running the Samba server of the person with access privileges to the share. Use these two templates to add shares for all the files users may want to access from the server machine.

Your server should be fully configured now. With what you added to the defaults provided by your distribution, your completed smb.conf should look something like this:

[global]
security = share
workgroup = HOME
server string = %h server
log file = /var/log/samba/log.%m
max log size = 1000
dns proxy = No
hosts allow = 192.168.0.
hosts deny = ALL
printing = cups
printcap name = cups

[printers]
path = /var/spool/samba
printable = Yes
browseable = No

[print$]
path = /var/lib/samba/printers

[Public Directory]
path = /Public/Files
guest ok = yes
read only = no
browseable = yes

[Private Directory]
path = /private/files/
valid users = me
read only = yes
browseable = no

Before you leave the server machine you have a few more quick chores. First, enter any users that will be accessing the Samba server into the following command:

smbpasswd -a user

You will be prompted to enter a Samba password for each user. You can change the password at any time by logging in as the desired user and running smbpasswd. Now restart your Samba server using this command:

/etc/init.d/samba restart

Accessing Samba shares from Windows clients

Head over to a Windows machine to try out your new setup. Your new server should appear in Windows’ My Network Places (look for the shortcut on your desktop, by default). Alternatively, open the Start menu and click “Run…”, then enter:

server

Replacing server with the name or IP address of the machine running your Samba server. A Windows Explorer window with the browseable shares from your server should open up. If you’ve made a non-browseable share, access it using this link:

servershare name

Is is easy to make shared directories more accessible. In Windows XP, right click on the share in Explorer and choose “Map Network Drive…” You will be able to assign them a drive letter, such as Z:, so that they may be easily found in My Computer, even after a reboot.

In my testing on Windows XP with the security level set to share, printers are automatically be detected and available to use from the Windows machine. With user level security set, it was necessary to log into the server in a Windows Explorer window before trying to print. Your experience on other versions of Windows may vary.

Accessing SMB/CIFS shares from other Linux machines

Samba and Windows shares can be easily accessed from the default file managers of both Gnome and KDE. We’ll begin with accessing shares from Nautilus in Gnome. Open Nautilus and go to File -> Connect to Server.

Choose “Windows share” from the listbox and enter the server name or IP address of your Samba server. You can also click the “Browse Network” button and look in the “Windows Network” directory to search for the server manually. Click “Connect” and a Nautilus window will open with the browseable resources of your Samba server.

Accessing Samba shares with Konqueror is just as simple. To browse for your server, enter the URL remote:/ in Konqueror. For direct access, type the URL of the server in directly in this format:

smb://user@server/share

Note that user and share are optional criteria.

Configuring printers over Samba is similarly easy in both these desktop environments. In Gnome, go to System -> Administration -> Printing. In the printer configuration application, select Printer -> Add printer. You will be prompted for your password. In the add printer wizard, select “Network Printer” and then “Windows Printer SMB” from the listbox. You will be prompted for a user name and password on your Samba server. Identify your Host and Printer on the Samba server and then move on to the next screen. Select your printer model and then click Apply.

To do the same in KDE, open the configuration center by launching the command kcontrol. Navigate to the Printers module and go to Add -> Add Printer/Class… In the resulting dialog, click Next and then select “SMB shared printer (Windows).” Click Next again and configure the username and password of a “Normal account,” if using user level security. Click Next another time and then Scan to browse for your Samba server.

Alternatively, enter the server details manually. On the next screen, select your printer model from the list. Click through the next few screens and give your networked printer a title to finish up.

Troubleshooting

If you’ve experienced any problems getting any of this functionality to work, turn to the Samba troubleshooting checklist. A quick trick borrowed from that document for testing your Samba configuration file for obvious errors is to run the following command:

testparm smb.conf

Again, the exact path of your smb.conf may vary by distribution.

We have only explored basic Samba functionality here, tailored for a home network. More extreme usage scenarios are addressed in detail in the Samba by example guide.