[Avon]

Here is the dilemma.

I would like to share the following:
/Users/userA/Music/iTunes/iTunes_Music

With userB on a windows machine.

Also, userB must be able to access the following:
/Users/userB/

At the same time.


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Here is what does not work:

Making a hard link to the music directory in the userB account. I am having trouble making hard links to directories in OS X, as far as I can tell the kernel does not allow it.


Logging into both accounts at the same time using windows 2000. I don't think its possible. If it is I don't know how to do it, and i'd rather not do it this way. I want both user to keep their passwords private.

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I could put the iTunes stuff in the /Users/Shared folder, but if I do, how to I get to it over the network using SMB? Would this be the best way? User that log in are restricted to their account folders. I would rather keep users restricted to their proper folders also..


In short, what is the best way of doing this?

Thanks.

[solvent211]

Samba (SMB) is probably what you want. It will let you mount remote folders on your Windows boxes to OS X directories and map OS X directories to drive letters on the PCs.

There are probably better resources, but check out the Samba/SMB articles on MacOSXHints (link here). In particular, read the one about enabling SWAT. SWAT is a configuration tool that will let you (relatively) easily setup sharing along the lines of what you are wanting.

[Avon]

Enabling SMB is not the problem. Widows file sharing works fine. The problems are listed in the first post.

[superlarry]

i think it'll be best to do something like put the music in /Users/shared or even just /shared and then use the SWAT configuration to share that folder and the userB folder. try "man smbd" in /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app to see the options. also try "man smb.conf" (smb.conf is the file you'll have to edit.. i forget if "man smb.conf" works in OSX, and i'm in linux right now so i can't check).

[Avon]

Thanks. i will try that.

[solvent211]

Originally posted by Avon:
Enabling SMB is not the problem. Widows file sharing works fine. The problems are listed in the first post.

Enabling "Windows File Sharing" is only the first step...

Once you've got SMB running, create samba user accounts for UserA and UserB (if required) and then edit the smb.conf (or use SWAT) to allow access to /Users/userB/ and /Users/userA/Music/iTunes/iTunes_Music/ for both users (or whatever combination of users you want...).

When you've got it configured correctly, when UserB logs in with his unique password, he will see a folder associated with /Users/userA/.../iTunes_Music as well as a folder for /UserB/userB. When UserA logs in with his unique password, he will see a folder associated with /Users/UserA/...

If I'm not mistaken, this is what you were asking for. Hard links are not the way to accomplish that (as you've discovered).