I just got my Ubuntu 10.10 laptop to finally be able to access my Windows 7 Professional's shares, and I'd like to share how I got it working. Whenever I would go to Places > Network on Ubuntu, and then double click on my Windows computer (sometimes after finding it in Windows Network > {workgroup name}), it would immediately bring up a box saying "Password required for {computer name}". My Windows password wouldn't work here, but I didn't even want to be asked for a password. In Windows, under Network and Sharing Center > Choose homegroup and sharing options > Change advanced sharing settings..., Turn off password protected sharing was already selected. So, I eventually found out that samba (the program Linux uses to talk with Microsoft's SMB network share protocol) has a bug of sorts. The format of the SMB packets coming from a clean Windows 7 is known by samba. However, if you install Windows Live Sign-In Assistant (which is provided through Microsoft Update) on Windows 7, the packets coming from Windows 7 are modified, and samba can not handle this. A patch has been written for samba, but Ubuntu's repositories (which has samba version 2:3.5.4~dfsg-1ubuntu8.1) does not yet have that patch. Also, it seems Microsoft has stopped Windows Live Sign-In Assistant from appearing in Programs and Features. It doesn't appear even if you specifically download and install it separately. I did, however, notice that the installer calls itself Windows Live Essentials 2011. So I found that in Programs and Features, and uninstalled it. It asked which components I wanted to uninstall, and I selected all of them. Rebooted Windows, and now I can access the share no problem. I also grabbed the offending packet using Wireshark before and after that uninstall. The packet is indeed different. Specifically, without Windows Live Essentials 2011, there is no mechToken in the packet. The current version of samba available is 3.5.6. I may try downloading and compiling that later, and see if it deals with the change that Windows Live Essentials 2011 makes OK. Also, it may be possible to get the share working without uninstalling every single Windows Live Essentials 2011 component. You may want to try that if you would like to keep a component.
Alright, I just found that I can't access my Windows 7 shares again, after rebooting Windows a few times. I look in Programs and Features, and lo and behold, Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant is there now. Windows Live Essentials 2011 is not. I have not idea how Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant appeared, but I'm uninstalling it now. So it looks like we have to look for both programs now. Maybe periodically, or maybe just every time it breaks.
Thanks for figuring this out! Quite a few people have run into this problem in the last few days.
I figured out why Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant appeared (and it did a few times for me). There's a Microsoft Update, marked as Recommended in the Important section (meaning it wants to install when you shut down your computer) called Games for Windows Software V3.4. Installing this installs Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant too. So, I found and uninstalled Microsoft Games for Windows - LIVE and Microsoft Games for Windows - LIVE Redistributable in Programs and Features. This stopped that update from appearing. I tried reinstalling Windows Live Essentials 2011 to see if sharing would still work, but it broke. So, in conclusion so far, you must uninstall all of these: Windows Live Essentials 2011 Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant Microsoft Games for Windows - LIVE Microsoft Games for Windows - LIVE Redistributable After uninstalling one and rebooting, another may appear, so be sure to check. Oh, and it looks like compiling and installing samba from source isn't as simple as ./configure, make, sudo make install, and samba doesn't provide a .deb installer, so I guess I'll need to wait until an updated samba is pushed to Ubuntu's repositories.
There are a couple of extra steps needed to build Samba, but it's nothing too complicated. Just follow the instructions at http://www.samba.org/samba/docs/man/...compiling.html
Hi All, This problem has been a frustration for me also. I'm a complete Linux/Ubuntu/SMB n00b but I finally found a soultion that worked in the REDHAT bug forums. https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=651722 Basically you add client use spnego = no the smb.conf and restart smbd. As soon as I did that - up came share access. There was no need for me to screw with WLE 2011 at all. Hopes this helps someone. -Rick
Just to clarify, you just need to add the line: client use spnego = no to /etc/samba/smb.conf right? Is there anywhere in the file it needs to go, and section? Dan
I added it into the global section near the top of smb.conf, restarted smbd, and it's working! NB, there may be some scenarios this will break rather than fix.
Hurray, "client use spnego = no" worked for me as well! Thank you very much for the solution, it bugged me for months.
It worked for me too. Many thanks.
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