up vote 1 down vote favorite
share [g+] share [fb]

I am trying to share a folder on the Mac (Leopard) to my Windows XP laptop. I went into System Prefs, clicked on Sharing, added the folder called TwoTB and it seemed to work (more or less). That is all it took.

Then all of a sudden, clicking on a \\macmini\TwoTB started asking for a password. I tried entering my userid/password - did not work. I tried creating a new person in the Sharing applet complete with a password. Tried entering that on the WinXP laptop - still did not work.

Simply hitting \\macmini used to bring up the list of shares, now it asks for a password.

What am I missing?

link|improve this question
84% accept rate
For the username and password have you tried entering \\macmini\username instead of just your username? – Chealion Dec 8 '09 at 5:15
Tried that approach: nothing. Btw, not \\macmini\username, but simply macmini\username should do the trick, but it does not. – AngryHacker Dec 8 '09 at 22:10
feedback

1 Answer

up vote 4 down vote accepted

It sounds like guest connections got disabled. The checkbox to reenable it is in System Preferences -> Accounts pane -> Guest Account in the sidebar -> "Allow guests to connect to shared folders".

BTW, if you want to allow non-guest access to the shared files from Windows (i.e. get it to accept the account passwords), you need to enable Windows compatability for each account in System Preferences -> Sharing pane -> File Sharing -> Options -> the list of user accounts under "Share files and folders using SMB (Windows)".

link|improve this answer
All the options you mentioned we turned on. Still nothing. – AngryHacker Dec 8 '09 at 22:12
Got it working. I went into Sharing, then Options, then added a checkbox under my name. Then I could log in with my name mac name. It still does not explain why Guest Sharing does not work, but that's for another question. – AngryHacker Dec 8 '09 at 22:50
Didn't provide the answer, but good effort nonetheless, accepted. – AngryHacker Dec 8 '09 at 22:51
If the guest checkbox is on but you can't connect, there may be something weird in the config files; first thing to try is turning guest off & back on to see if that fixes it. If not, and you want to dig, check the config files: /var/db/smb.conf should contain lines that say "auth methods = guest odsam" and "map to guest = Bad User"; /var/db/samba/smb.shares should contain a bunch of sections for users' public folders, each of which should include "guest ok = yes". – Gordon Davisson Dec 9 '09 at 6:20
feedback

Your Answer

 
or
required, but never shown
discard

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.