Mapping a Network Share
For the older Red Hat distributions, the reader is prompted to refer to the previous method for mapping drives from Red Hat Linux, under Mapping a Network Share (RH7)
Since the paradigm shift to Fedora Core, Red Hat has changed the method for mapping drives and now embraces the newer Common Internet File System (CIFS). Hence the erstwhile and trusty smbmount command has fallen from favour.
To map a network share is to create a shortcut link on the local machine (actually, a directory) which represents a shared directory on another machine.
Under Linux, drives (directories) are sometimes kept in the /mnt directory, such as /mnt/cdrom and /mnt/floppy
These are known as mount points. MS-DOS and Windows use a local drive letter to represent a network share, but Linux uses an subdirectory in the /mnt directory.
a] Create a directory in the /mnt directory which will represent the share,
i.e. mkdir /mnt/things
b] Use the mount command to create a link from the shared directory, such as 'stuff' on the computer called 'mypc'
i.e. mount -t cifs //mypc/stuff /mnt/things
Changing to the local Linux directory /mnt/things will now take you straight to the contents of the shared directory \stuff on the computer called 'mypc'. You can also substitute the remote computer's IP Address for its hostname.
However..
One main problem with the above command such as it is, is that only root can run it by default. This means that when you map to a shared resource, that system will take your username and passsword as root's. This can be a problem if the shared resource does not have your root username an dpassword in its own user database.
To get around this, it is possible to map/mount a remote share using a different username and password, by cunning use of the -o switch..
i.e. mount -t cifs //mypc/stuff /mnt/things -o username=andy
The system should then prompt you for the user andy's password. Obviously you will substitute your own username/password combination as well as computername/sharename/mountpoints, to the above examples.
For more information, type man mount.cifs in a terminal (console) window.
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