Connect Fedora to Windows 98

[duh]

my problem is trying to mount a network drive from fedora 8 to windows 98 shared folder.

my current network setup in the office is three windows 98 desktops connected to a hub, with one acting like a server. the two workstations have mapped network drive to the shared folder of the server. both of these stations connect to the network without any passwords required.

i'm trying to replace one workstation with fedora and tried to execute the command:

mount -t cifs //169.254.66.53//share /home/wesley/share

it would request for a password so I simply press Enter. Then it would display an error:

mount error 2 = no such file or directory

I tried another method:

mount -t smbfs //169.254.66.53//share /home/wesley/share

and it displays unknown filesystem type 'smbfs'

I also tried using smbmount but bash would say no such file or directory.

Please note that I can see the windows 98 shared folder in gnome of fedora.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

[glennzo]

Try this: mount -t cifs //169.254.66.53/share /home/wesley/share
It's the same line you were using but with a single forward slash in front of the word share.

[duh]

oops sorry my message was a typo. here's the actual command line:

mount -t cifs //169.254.66.53/share /home/wesley/share

thanks for the reply glennzo

[glennzo]

I'm fairly sure that cifs has replaced smbfs. Here's a line that worked for me when I was actually using it. mount -t cifs //fedora7/temp /media/pic -o username=glenn,password="". My point is try adding the username and password parameters to the end of the line. I also wonder if Win98 will support cifs ??

[duh]

ok i'll try that. if i don't want to put passwords should i do what you suggested (password="")?

i read from somewhere in the internet that windows 98 doesn't support cifs

[glennzo]

Yes, use the quote for no password. And I think you're right about 98 / cifs.

[duh]

this is what i entered:

mount -t cifs //server/share /home/wesley/share -o username=wesley,password=""

here's the result:

mount error: could not find target server. TCP name server server/share not found. No ip address specified and hostname not found.

since i read from a website that cifs could only read ip address and not the name of the server, i use the ip address

mount -t cifs //169.254.158.90/share /home/wesley/share -o username=wesley,password=""

it displayed:

mount error 112 = host is down

i tried:

mount -t cifs //169.254.158.90/share /home/wesley/share

it requested a password, pressed enter and displayed error 112 again.

if windows 98 is incompatible with cifs, what should i use?

[glennzo]

Time for you to do some investigation. Find out what's required to network with Windows 98. I haven't had a Windows 98 machine in the house for years so I can't play around with one here. Find out if you can in fact use CIFS with Windows 98. Can you ping the Windows machine from the Fedora box? Did you install samba after installing Fedora? There is an smb.conf file with the stock install but you do need to install samba, yum install samba. Have you edited the /etc/samba/smb.conf file at all? Are the services smb and nmb running? While I can tell you how to get samba installed and running and what to edit in the smb.conf file I can't test it myself.

[glennzo]

I DO have a Windows 98 machine! Someone gave me a computer yesterday and it runs 98! So I installed a network card in the box. Took me a freakin' hour to get the drives loaded but it's time to play with networking Fedora / 98. Now I need to remember the steps I took to make this work.

* I set the Windows network / login to use client for microsoft networks This forces a real login win a username and password.
* Added a user on the windows box with a name and a password.
* Rebooted the windows box and logged in with the username and password.
* Added a user on the Fedora box with the same name
sudo /usr/sbin/useradd jim
* Added jim to the samba users
smbpasswd -a jim
Two password prompts just press enter
* Edited /etc/samba/smb.conf to add in the global section
wins support = yes
encrypt passwords = yes

* Restart smb and nmb
sudo /sbin/service smb restart
sudo /sbin/service nmb restart
That's all I can remember right now, after all, it was like an hour ago that I did all this :rolleyes: Try it and see what you get.

Edit: I can now browse a shared folder on my Linux box from the Win98 box. I'm thinking that this may lead to the ability to mount a share as you are trying to do. I'll keep working on it.

[duh]

is the ping command similar to windows like ping 192.168.0.5?

i installed samba 3.028 and smbclient using the add/remove software in gnome. both smb and nmb are running. sorry i haven't peeked at my smb.conf for fear i might screw up everything.

[glennzo]

is the ping command similar to windows like ping 192.168.0.5?

i installed samba 3.028 and smbclient using the add/remove software in gnome. both smb and nmb are running. sorry i haven't peeked at my smb.conf for fear i might screw up everything.Ping is pretty much the same, yes. If you're afraid you'll screw up smb.conf make a backup of the file first, then go ahead and edit.

Edit: By the way, since I've made progress with the Win98/Linux thing I'm getting the same errors that you are getting when I try to mount the share.

[duh]

sorry to hear about that. please keep me posted on your progress. thank you.

[duh]

i tried to ping my server and there were responses.

i tried to make a link using gnome (right click on shared folder of server and make link) and it popped an error:

error "unsupported operation" while creating a link to "smb://server/share"

maybe my fedora can't mount network drives on computers with dynamic ip addresses?

[duh]

i did some research on the internet, and found something about using nfs. would this work or would it be harmful to other computers on the network?

[duh]

glennzo, were you able to successfully mount a network drive to windows 98 share? i did some readings in nabble dot com about smbmount and they said that windows 98 doesn't support cifs.

[glennzo]

glennzo, were you able to successfully mount a network drive to windows 98 share? i did some readings in nabble dot com about smbmount and they said that windows 98 doesn't support cifs.No. Matter of fact, after playing around with it for a while and giving up I kind of forgot about it. Been pretty busy with other stuff. I'm not surprised at your findings though. I thought that I had read that there was no CIFS support for Win98.

[duh]

darn. well, thanks for your time and help. i really appreciated it.

would you know if this issue be addressed in the next updates of fedora or samba?

[glennzo]

darn. well, thanks for your time and help. i really appreciated it. Your welcome. Sorry I couldn't be more helpful.
would you know if this issue be addressed in the next updates of fedora or samba?No idea. I doubt if it's an issue at all with the powers that be since Win98 is somewhat of a dead OS.

[jon80]

I encountered a dependency issue when I tried to install samba v3.0.26a on RedHat (using UI).

1 Running samba-3.0.26a.1.i386.rpm prompted me that the common files are required
2. When running sambe-common-3.0.26a-1.i386.rpm a message is displayed that a newer version is already installed.

However, I do not see any 'Samba' in the menu options, so I assume something is missing. Any ideas please?

Also any ideas on how to configure Samba so that Windows XP shares are visible?

RedHat Fedora 8 is running on a VMWare Workstation machine as a guest. Host runs Win XP 64 bit edition.

[glennzo]

Install samba from the command line using yum. yum install samba. That should take care of the dependencies.

[duh]

glennzo, I was able to find a windows xp machine and connect it to my office network. My fedora machine was able to mount a network drive to a shared folder of xp using
mount -t cifs //169.254.82.233/shareddocs /home/wesley/test

I had to use IP address or fedora won't find the xp folder. It prompted for a password, and I only pressed enter.

Thanks for your help.

My plan is to switch my windows 98 server with an xp server so I can mount a network drive to it. My current network is 1 windows 98 server, 1 windows 98 workstation, and 1 fedora workstation. All of them are set up to acquire IP address automatically. It seems I have to change them to acquire static IP address.

My question is: if I set up a static IP address to the server, would the workstations be able to connect to it if they are set up in acquiring IP address automatically? Or should I set all of them their own static IP addresses?

[glennzo]

I've had pretty good luck with DHCP all around when the Windows boxes are running XP. One thing that I've found very helpful is to add the ip addresses of all the machines to /etc/hosts. Even though they are all using DHCP they seem to keep the same ip address they had when they come on line after being turned off.

[duh]

I'll observe their IP addresses for a few days. Thanks.

[jon80]

I couldn't mount any shares using mount -t cifs //<ip>/<sharename>, somehow

[duh]

glennzo my windows machines did not have the same respective IP addresses, although Fedora had the same address for two days so far. They are all within the 169.254.xxx.xxx range. So if I assign a static IP address to the server would I encounter any network problems like the workstations unable to connect to it?

[glennzo]

IF the server has a static ip address the workstations should always be able to find it.

[duh]

success! the workstations were able to detect the server with a static IP address. Now all I need to do is make the mount permanent.

[duh]

glennzo, i've stumbled on one of your posts in this forum:

"The next line is the actual line in /etc/fstab:
//oldendorff/d /media/sharephoto cifs username=egon,password="",uid=500,gid=500 0 0"

what does "uid=500,gid=500 0 0" mean?

[glennzo]

User ID and Group ID. I'm pretty sure that the 0 0 is disk checking parameters. Try leaving that stuff off and see if you can still get the mount to work. Something like this:
//oldendorff/d /media/sharephoto cifs username=egon,password="" Have you been reading this page (http://http://us1.samba.org/samba/docs/man/Samba-HOWTO-Collection/) ?

[duh]

here's my fstab

/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 / ext3 defaults 1 1
LABEL=/boot /boot ext3 defaults 1 2
tmpfs /dev/shm tmpfs defaults 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts gid=5,mode=620 0 0
sysfs /sys sysfs defaults 0 0
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol01 swap swap defaults 0 0

where should I place the mount?

oops. didn't see your samba link

[glennzo]

Just add it to the bottom of the file.

[duh]

I was reading a document about cifs and I saw this:

"mount -t cifs //tcp-name-of-server/sharename /mnt -o user=username,sec=lanman,servern=SERVERNAME"

"A security option allowing weaker password hashes to be used. Specifying “sec=lanman” in the mount options allows the client to send weaker lanman hashes to the server. Older servers such as Windows 98 require this."

the document is at http://pserver.samba.org/samba/ftp/cifs-cvs/linux-cifs-client-guide.pdf

Just want to share this info.

[duh]

I just had a thought. Every time Fedora starts, it would try to connect to my network. I would have to wait around 20 seconds before it would say local connection established. If I edit my fstab so I could mount my network drive automatically, would it encounter any errors because of the time it takes to connect to the network?

[duh]

Help! Now my Fedora can't connect to the network!

I changed my network card setting to statically obtain IP address with 169.254.1.102 (my server is 169.254.1.101) and it said "disconnected from network." I switched back to automatically obtain IP address, restarted, then still "disconnected from network."

edit: posted at the wrong thread. made a new thread.
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=183403