[X4U] connecting to a windows file share?

[Stroller]

On Dec 13, 2004, at 7:59 pm, Russell McGaha wrote:
> ...I've a client who's trying to access their shared volumes [they 
> connect to them at boot time on their PC] from a new G5 with all 
> updates applied.  I've tried "smb://severname/file/directory name" 
> without success; anyone have any experience doing this??

On Dec 14, 2004, at 9:22 pm, Russell McGaha wrote:
> ...I think I just need to get the correct SMB syntax to include the 
> username and password in the url call; should it be in the form of 
> "smb://Serverename/Directoryname:username:password" ?

Ok... just to be super-clear about how you're trying to connect... I 
take it you're trying to connect using the "Go" > "Connect to 
server..." in the Finder menu, also accessed by Apple-K..?

 From there I rarely give the whole path... just typing 
"smb://servername" in that window should give you a drop-down selection 
of all the shares available on that windows box, as shown at 
<http://mac.stroller.uk.eu.org/Select%20a%20share.jpg>. I think that if 
you need a username & password you'll be prompted for it. If 
"smb://servername" doesn't work, try "smb://the.i.p.address".

As far as full smb-paths are concerned, I think 
"smb://severname/file/directory name" is possibly incorrect syntax: it 
would be "smb://severname/share name"; if referring to individual files 
on SMB shares is allowed, then hierarchically "smb://severname/share 
name/file" would seem more likely valid. I think that if specifying 
username & password is allowed, then one would probably use 
"smb://user:pass@severname/share name" (it's certainly that order for 
ftp://user:pass@host").

Note that "share name" in the paragraph above is different to 
"directory name" - in Windows when one shares a directory one right 
clicks on that directory and clicks the "Share this folder..." button - 
one is then prompted to allocate a name to that share. The share-name 
can be different from the directory name, presumably to save conflicts 
when sharing c:\foo and c:\bar\foo.

Hence one could share the "C:\" directory (a horribly bad but 
widespread practice) of my_box as "the_whole_drive" - when accessing it 
over the network it would be referred to not as "smb://my_box/c" but as 
"smb://my_box/the_whole_drive".

Your post also reminded me that Samba provides some command line tools 
for querying windows shares - you may  find `smbtree` and `smbutil view 
//servername` useful.

Stroller.