Networking All-in-One For Dummies, 7th Edition

Chapter 5

Doing the Samba Dance

IN THIS CHAPTER

Finding out what Samba does

Installing Samba on your Linux computer

Configuring Samba

Using the Samba client

Until now, you probably thought of Samba as a Brazilian dance with intricate steps and fun rhythms. In the Linux world, however, Samba refers to a file- and printer-sharing program that allows Linux to mimic a Windows file and print server so that Windows computers can use shared Linux directories and printers. If you want to use Linux as a file or print server in a Windows network, you need to know how to dance the Samba.

Understanding Samba

Because Linux and Windows have such different file systems, you can’t create a Linux file server simply by granting Windows users access to Linux directories. Windows client computers can’t access files in the Linux directories. Too many differences exist between the file systems. For example:

• Linux filenames are case sensitive, whereas Windows filenames are not. For example, in Windows, File1.txt and file1.txt are the same file. In Linux, they're different files.
• In Linux, periods aren’t ...