How to mount NFS shares from Ubuntu box onto Windows XP as Client

[joTi]

Hi there, im really busting my *** with this.

I have Vista, not XP, and the SFU for XP seems much more advanced and simple in a way.

The Vista crappy version doesn't have the Map Tab and so forth leaving me scratching my head.

Is there a walkthrough for this on Vista.
Help would be much appreciated.

[Jose Catre-Vandis]

Hi there, im really busting my *** with this.

I have Vista, not XP, and the SFU for XP seems much more advanced and simple in a way.

The Vista crappy version doesn't have the Map Tab and so forth leaving me scratching my head.

Is there a walkthrough for this on Vista.
Help would be much appreciated.

I agree that Vista appears to handle things in a more transparent way!

You should simply be able to connect network shares from the Tools menu, and map a network drive. Issues may bee around authentification though. I overcome this by using the same logins and passwords on Vista and the server and/or you maybe need to add the "Vista" user to your server.

Where have you got to - when do things stop working, and perhaps we can narrow down where the problem is.

[joTi]

I agree that Vista appears to handle things in a more transparent way!

You should simply be able to connect network shares from the Tools menu, and map a network drive. Issues may bee around authentification though. I overcome this by using the same logins and passwords on Vista and the server and/or you maybe need to add the "Vista" user to your server.

Where have you got to - when do things stop working, and perhaps we can narrow down where the problem is.

First off, the tools menu, I don't know which one exactly you mean because I am on a Swedish edition of Vista.

But if i may translate my Swedish menus freely it says something like this.

Archive | "Measurements/Manage" | "Show/Display" | Window | Help


If you mean the Manage (perhaps Tools to you?) tab it has these options (still freely translated) when the "Services for NFS" in the left frame is selected.

"Connect to another computer"
"New window "from here""
"Export list..."
"Properties"
"Help"


If the "Client for NFS" is selected in the left frame is selected the following will appear in the "Manage" tab:

"Start service"
"Stop service"
"New window "from here""
"Properties"
"Help"




However if you mean that a Tools post should exist on the left frame there is none for me, neither is there a "User Name Mapping" post in the left frame like all the walkthroughs are referring to.



So im pretty much stuck as soon as I open the Administration application, and really need to be thoroughly guided through this.

Some screenshots from you guys would help a TON.

Sidenote: when i type
showmount -e servername
the output lists my shared NFS volumes just as it should.


Ps. Sorry if my English might confuse you.

[Jose Catre-Vandis]

Sorry, haven't done this in a while and was a long way from a Vista box!

#########################
Open an Explorer window using Start -> Computer
You should see "Map A Network Drive" in the Toolbar at the top
Click on this
In the dialog box enter the nfs drive info in this format:

192.168.0.10:/media/video

(Assumes your nfs server IP is 192.168.0.10 and you are sharing by nfs with /media/video)
Click Finish
#######################

Vista will probably have a think then show the share in the Explorer window, and open another explorer window at the share.

If this doesn't work, try clicking on the "connect using a different user name" and enter the login details for the server. As I said before, I set up a user on the server that matches the user login for Vista so connecting shares requires no authentication for me.


To access the properties in the Admin Application, right clck on the "Services for nfs" in the left pane, and click on properties - this will open the properties dialog
In the Services for NFS Properties dialog I have ticked the box for user name mapping, and entered the name of my Vista pc in the box (don't know if this makes any difference!)

You can right click on the "Client for nfs" in the left pane to access properties for file permissions as well

Let me know how you get on

[joTi]

Ahh, It was an Explorer window, no wonders then

Well, it came to an screaming halt again.
Vista just yells that it cannot connect to that adress, i have substituted your example ip for my servers of course!

And i configured the Admin Application like you, and I guess that the "Client for NFS" should be running.
However, when i click "start service" it gives me an error:

"Could not start the service - The depending service does not exist or is marked for removal."


OOk?

Perhaps i should reinstall nfs-service on vista.


[EDIT]

Reinstalled the nfs-service and got one of the shares mounted in Vista.

Only one left, which is giving me some trouble.

"Could not create the connected network unit because of the following error:
An unexpected error has occurd."

Windows, you gotta love it

[Jose Catre-Vandis]

Yeay we got somewhere!

I do remember that on occasion, if I tried to mount more than one share the second one would bork, but it didn't happen last night!

Well done for sorting it out

[joTi]

Yeay we got somewhere!

I do remember that on occasion, if I tried to mount more than one share the second one would bork, but it didn't happen last night!

Well done for sorting it out

Yeah, we really did!

Well, as you said, after i had rebooted the computer the second one mounted right up as well.

There is, however, a couple of slight problems left.

1. Windows seems to forget about my User/Pass data between startup's , i wonder how i can get it to remember? hmm.

2. It seems that as soon i browse the NFS mounts Windows get really sluggish, i really don't know why. Sometimes it locks the system up.
With Samba, which i used in between, I never had that problem, something is taking way too long for Vista to handle.

Any suggestions?

Big thumbs up on the support! =D>

[Jose Catre-Vandis]

If I remember right, (and this worked in XP) once you have your share mounted, try creating a shortcut for the share on your desktop (or place where you like shortcuts). A doubleclick on this shortcut on the next reboot should load up the share.

The other way is to tick the box in the map network drive dialog to make the share persist across reboots. I had some problems with this, so used the first suggestion, though not needed to try this on Vista yet.

[joTi]

I have tried those methods, and they don't seem to work.

However, it seems like I can change my UID and GID by right clicking my mounted drives in Vista and enter the Properties of the drive.
Perhaps if I enter those values as they should be (instead of 1000 & 1000) I could get rid of that sluggish feel, and mount easier?

Now, an embarrassing question, how do I look up my true UID & GID?

[EDIT]
Nevermind, found it

[KennedyM]

Thank you all for the excellent HowTo at the start of the thread, and for the subsequent updates, experiences, etc.

We followed the suggestions, and, generally, had success with accessing the NFS exports in the Windows clients, when we used a one-for-one match between Windows and Unix users.

We would prefer an approach whereby a client PC would have a "standard" build, and would have a generic minimal-rights username for initial sign-on for all Windows users. This would not be matched within SFU to any specific username in Linux. Then, when the PC user wants access to the NFS exports, the precise Linux-username (and PW) should be submitted, to define what rights that user has on the shares. We tried with some and no username mappings in SFU, and changed other settings, etc... We get Login screens, but we've never managed to get any username/pw combo to be accepted.

Other posters here seem to have had similar experiences.

We would greatly appreciate any pointers or suggestions.
- Mike