Saturday 19th September
Tip 310 - MacOS[147] - Problems with Windows sharing.
I have covered the sharing of files with windows computers before and advised that it is worth sticking bonjour on the Windows computers especially from printing. You should be able to just access files on Windows computers from MacOS machines and vice versa but sometimes problems persist.
So here we have a bit of a check list…..
Make sure the hardware is working
Yes, a bit of a no brainer this one but make sure they are both accessing the network. The easiest check is that they both access the internet
Make sure the IP addresses are in the same range
I have explained about IP addresses before but just to quickly cover this, there are several ranges of IP address left out of the WWW so that you can use these on an internet network. Also you will notice a SUBNET MASK this tells your computer (simplistically) which computers are local. So if you have your router as 192.168.0.1 (the range from 192.168.0.0 to 192.168.1.255 is acceptable) and you have a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 then your computers will expect local machines to be in the same range of 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.0.255
So basically pick a subnet such as 192.168.0 and make sure anything with a fixed address is in that net.
Set all SUBNET MASKS to 255.255.255.0
If your router gives a bank of addresses to pass to laptops etc using DHCP then pick a range inside of this subnet such as 192.168.0.100 to 192.168.0.150
Anything with a fixed IP address place in the same subnet but outside of the automatic range such as 192.168.0.90
Make sure the Workgroups are the same
In Windows inside SYSTEM in CONTROL PANEL make sure the workgroup is HOME or whatever you decide to chose.
In MacOS go to APPLE :: System preferences… :: Network
Click on the adapter in the left hand pane that you are using so AIRPORT for me….
Click on Location and then click Edit Location
Click on the [+] and a new location called "untitled" will appear change this to whatever your workgroup is called and click [DONE].
If you are running wireless join the relevant network (select it under Network Name).
Now click on [Advanced]
under DNS tab click on the right hand "+" and add the IP address of your router. Click on the left hand "+" and add the name of your workgroup as a search domain.
under WINS tab click on the down arrow for Workgroup and change this to your workgroup.
<optional> under TCP/IP change "Configure IPv6" to OFF
Click [OK] in the bottom right
Click [APPLY] in the bottom right
Make sure SMB is switched on
SMB is the protocol used by Windows and Linux machines (mainly) and to switch it on is quite simple.
In MacOS go to APPLE :: System preferences… :: Sharing
At the top of the window you will see "Computer Name", change this to the name you want other computer to see this computer as.
Click on "File Sharing" in the left hand pane.
Click on the tick to switch it on.
Click on [OPTIONS]
Click on "Share files and folder using AFP" & "Share files and folder using SMB (Windows)"
Click on the account name and tick it, you will need to enter the password.