I am new to linux and openSuSe. I have been reading a lot of how tos that I have found on the net about accessing windows shares with opensuse. None of it really makes sense to me. Basically, I have a home file server that i want to be able to access my mp3s from with my opensuse box. I understand that I probably have to use Samba to do this. Some of the tutorials say that you can just mount the windows share to the desktop using command line, but I don’t really understand how to use the command line in opensuse. I am just wondering what is going to be the quickest and easiest way to setup access to my windows shares??
Hi there and welcome to openSUSE forums.
Think of a two-step procedure. First step is to get windows/Suse networking going. Second step is to make the windows share available as a mapped drive. Mapped drives are commonplace in windows – you’re probably familiar with them. It makes a netwirk share in a windows network to imitate a hard drive in your windows system. Well you can d that in Linux too. But forget about that for the moment. leave it to step 2.
Step 1 is to get to see the windows share from Suse’s network browser. How you are advised depends a bit on your desktop environment – so what are you using: KDE4, KDE3.5.x or Gnome?
Swerdna
To quickly access a windows share;
For GNOME;
open Nautilus and hit <CTRL><L> to get your address bar (instead of location buttons). In the address bar enter :
smb://<ip address or name server>/<sharename>
or
smb://<ip address or name server>/<C$> (for the administrative share)
KDE has the same functionality by using fish://… in Konqueror
If you want to mount samba shares every time you start the pc, also have a look at swerdna’s site, loads of good info and tutorials there!
Hope that helps,
Wj
I really would like to have the share mapped so I can access it everytime I login without having to do anything extra. I have the folders already shared on my windows file server so my other windows pcs can access them. I just need to know how to get them mapped in openSuse. I am using Gnome. I will check out Swerdna’s site and see what I can find. Thanks guys.
Probably you can see the windows shares. If not you change the workgroup name to match the LAN ans open the firewall or turm it off. FFI more details in the Samba LAN primer.
Cifs mount tutorial should get you mapping them
Questions welcomed
CAUTION!
The instructions on the swerdna.net page to set up windows shares by configuring your network card and samba, broke my installation.
I could no longer shutdown using the gui shutdown option, I had to go into terminal, su to root and issue a shutdown from the command line.
Now, when I try to start the network card config from yast, I get:
YaST got signal 11 at YCP file network/routines.ycp:594
/sbin/yast2: line 386: 3901 Segmentation fault $ybindir/y2base $module “$@” “$SELECTED_GUI” $Y2_GEOMETRY $Y2QT_ARGS
Lenovo T61 originally with SLED 10, now trying OS 11, and now 10.3 so I can get working video and other things.
Looks like it’s back to ubuntu. They annoy me but it sets up things users want without 3 days of screwing around as I have done with suse. again. This is my 3rd attempt to use SuSe on a PC, and my last.
I really want to like SuSe but it is user antagonistic.
I also really want to like linux, but I may have to buy a copy of winxp to use this thing, since linux seems to be stuck back in the win3.1 era, when you still had to spend days on a command line configuring simple things.
I can get that you are not happy with the outcome of that… Though I do question if it’s the instructions Swerdna gives on his site or that something else went wrong. Sorry to hear your configuration messed up though.
Where you trying to setup a server share on openSUSE itself (instead of connecting to one)? there is a Samba Server setup module in YaST for that that lets you setup straight forward shares.
As I am curious to your remark how would Ubuntu be different here? It’s maps in a similar way… or is there a tool you use? Could be there is something similar on openSUSE.
Linux is just different, there are some things you need to know about it, but for many, they don’t see much of the command line. They key in getting it better is to listen and learn…
A mapping tool would be a good enhancement to build in (if it’s not already there).
Take care,
Wj
A post today made me have another look at Nautilus… the things sometimes that are under ones nose that just get overlooked.
For those wanting to connect to a server/share the is an option in the Nautilus main menu, under File, called ‘Connect to Server’ (how do you mean? Obvious??). Not sure if this is a new option in GNOME 2.22 or if just missed it before.
This function allows a normal user to connect to a server and make a bookmark for it.
Just wanted to add that in here…
Cheers,
Wj
Using the Nautilus Connect to Server option, I can’t connect to either samba or WebDav shares. For samba it gives me :
Can’t display location “smb://192.168.190.9/share/”
The specified location is not mounted
For WebDav I get :
Can’t display location “dav://username@long URL”
HTTP Error: HTTP Version Not Supported
Originally it wouldn’t ask for a password on Samba; I checked and found that pam-cifs wasn’t installed, and installed it. Now it DOES ask for a password – before erroring out. 
Anybody else seeing this or have any ideas on what’s happening? Note that, if I try to mount manually, I can mount -t cifs, but -t smbfs gives me :
mount: unknown filesystem type ‘smbfs’
Thanks for any insight people can give me. The Samba mounts are inconvenient but doable through CLI; the WebDav is a real pain.
smbfs is not present. The replacement version of that, cifs, is present.