Re: Long Time Samba No Work-Need Expert Help On SAmba/Networking-Ahhh, Some Success

Well, after many painful trials involving many posts,
googles, suggestions and reading manuals and
official/unofficial user guides, this issue is solved.
I'm now able to "map network drives" from my WinXP. 
The solution was to add a line,"netbios name =
name_of_your_server (no spaces)", from 
http://doc.gwos.org/index.php/Share_files_using_Samba
found googling for "ubuntu samba smb.conf" and by
uncommenting the line "directory mask = 0775" in the
homes section(this line was uncommented in earlier
trials but still couldn't map drives).
I did not see the "netbios name" entry in the default
smb.conf file or in the Off/Unoff user guides or the
manuals that I recall. This made a solutions very
difficult. I desperately wanted an example of a
working smb.conf but couldn't find one googling or get
one from the user group.  That would have been
helpful. I would think the the user group would feel
that way, too, but no.  Resolving this issue took way
too much time, effort and patience than is warranted
and many less determined people would have abandoned
the effort if they had the problems I did.
I have some further comments that please consider as a
critique not criticism:

1. Both the official and unofficial user guides were
virtually useless in solving my problems.  Most
everything listed I had already done manually and
those new items that appeared were not plain, clear
instructions easily followed.  My earlier posts on the
subject exemplifies that point.
2. An example of a working smb.conf would be most
helpful for a noobie, or someone just not having the
knowledge of what goes in it as I am. 
3.Someone should edit the user guides to provide
explanations on those items that are unusual, cryptic
or easily misinterpreted.  No,not me as I don't have
the knowledge or experience.  The job wouldn't be hard
for a person with the knowledge.
4. I hate reading manuals(and guides) as they try to
cover too much and make clear nothing.  I wonder why
any body bothers.  They would be more useful if they
had two sections, one detailing setup and another
detailing how to use the program. If it's going to
clutter up my HDD space it should be useful to one
just starting Linux. Examples should be mandatory.
5. All default setups/conf files should just work out
of the box(windows does, bite my tongue as I like
Linux and Ubuntu). I don't see that this should be so
hard. I came to Ubuntu from Debian just because
someone told me how easy it is to install and use.  I
could fill in a whole month's of user list posts with
my trouble with Debian setup issues. Not user
friendly. Ubuntu does this better than any other linux
distro but it's a long way from perfect and you can't
always get a quick, down and dirty, fix from the list.
 This case is an example.
If I were a young person, I'd chalk it up to learning
and education.  But I don't have that time or luxury.
6.If Linux and Ubuntu are going to continue to make
inroads against windows it has to become even more
user friendly and just work out of the box as windows
usually does.  Wont argue about windows vs. Linux;
just my opinion and an _expression_ of my dislikes and
issues with Linux in general.

Well enough of this. Please take my comments as
constructive even if nothing is done about it as I
expect it wont.
Thanks to everyone offering help on this issue,
especially Karl who was most constructive and pointed
out things I wasn't aware of.  Many thanks.

Leonard Chatagnier
lenc5570@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

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I totally agree with Leonard, that the user guides are rather useless 
and the help from user groups isn't that good either. I also agree with 
Leonard that this is constructive criticism and I'm happy that Leonard 
spoke about this.

Having said this, I want to make it clear that I really like Ubuntu and 
I won't go back to Windows even if I think that it was at some points 
easier to use for an average computer user (setting up network etc.).

I have also googled and sent messages to both Finnish and English user 
groups. Nothing has helped.

I think that Ubuntu 7.04 is really user friendly. That's hy I like it. 
Solving problems with it is, however, not. There is still a lot to do in 
providing easy and thorough help. And yes, I have googled tens of help 
pages for over a week now.

I still can't find my Win XP machines from Ubuntu, and I still cannot 
find my Ubuntu from Win XP with netbios name, only with IP-number (which 
changes daily due to DHCPand automatic IP from ADSL provider).

I have tried Places - Network - etc and found Windows-network, workgroup 
and Ubuntu machine but nothing else. I have tried Places - Connect to 
Server. I have configured smb.conf in I don't know how many ways 
according to advice that I have found in HowTo's, user guides and user 
groups. Other people seem to have succeeded with similar problems. I 
don't seem to succeed.

Help, anyone?

Jürgen Römer