Windows Shared folder from Ubuntu

Ubuntu and windows file sharing is covered on so many web sites in great detail – searching for ubuntu Samba file sharing mount windows share etc will get many links

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=280473

http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Feisty

http://doc.gwos.org/index.php/Share_files_using_Samba

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=202605

https://help.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/serverguide/C/configuring-samba.html#windows-networking-clients

All I want to do is mount a windows shared folder on my ubuntu box and access the files; I am not worried about mounting during boot up and not sharing any files from ubuntu.

1. install smbfs
   1. $sudo apt-get install smbfs
2. use ‘mount’ to mount the file share
   1. for mount you need to create a local folder that will be the mount point for example create a folder test under /media
   2. then mount the share using
      1. $sudo mount -t smbfs -o username=myusername //192.168.0.10/sharename /media/test
      2. myusername – is a valid username on the windows machine
      3. the ip address is the ip of the windows machine
      4. sharename is the name given to the share on the windows machine
      5. This will prompt you for the passwor d- the password for myusername on the windows machine
      6. on successful password you will be able to see the contents of the sharedfolder under /media/test
      7. Note: if you this is the first time you are using sudo in this shell session or if sudo has timed out there will be two password prompts first for the sudo next for the share mount. you could avoid this by doing $sudo -v before doing the sudo mount
3. to umount
   1. $sudo umount /media/test

Ping, File Sharing stopped working

In my local network at home network file sharing, RDP, even ping stopped working for one my desktops.

I have ZoneAlarm Pro, Norton Antivirus and many other software installed disabling any of this didnt work. The culprit was Cisco VPN software.

My wife had installed Cisco VPN client software and everything was fine – but this creates a problem for any local network operations coming into the machine even when not connected to the VPN. Solution stop the “Cisco Systems, Inc. VPN Service” and everything works fine.

[The version of the Cisco VPN client is 4.8.02, this ]I dont know if there is an update for the software with the fix but for now I have changed the startup mode of the service from automatic to manual. This works for me since the sharing will be a problem only when connected to the VPN and for now this rarely happens.

(I found a blog post related to the same issue on http://wiki.helpware.net)