ssh and samba - need help setting up

[bradlewa]

So I've dabbled with Linux, but really don't know much. I like the idea of using a linux Sage server (few if any reboots, etc), and have set one up. But I would like to be able to access the saved tv shows on my Windows XP machine (not from sage, just from network neighborhood). From my limited Linux experience, I would think samba is the easiest way to do this. I also want to be able to put the server in the basement with no monitor - so I would need to be able to remotely access it from my XP machine. I vaguely remember using ssh or something like that along with Xming and putty on my PC to access an old MythTV box I toyed around with. Is this right?

Treat me as someone with limited Linux knowledge and walk me through this. I appreciate any help at all.

[bcjenkins]

To be honest, this is not so much a SageTV question as it is a general Linux one. It depends somewhat on the distro you are running which tells us where the config files are. Have you considered using google for terms like:

"setup samba share howto whatever your distro name is"

and

"setup secure ssh server howto whatever your distro name is"

Important to setup ssh using key based auth and turn off password.

For ssh client
http://www.unixwiz.net/techtips/putty-openssh.html

B

[bradlewa]

i just thought sage users would have had a recommended method.

[ntisdale]

Sage does have a preferred distribution, gentoo, that if installed as per Sage's instructions: www.sagetv.com/linuxOEMinstall.html has Samba and SSH enabled by default. If you've installed another distro you'll have to do as bcjenkins suggests and find distro specific instructions - if you're using a popular distro like Ubuntu or Fedora you should have no problem finding easy to follow guides for Samba and SSH access is normally included in the default install and should need no setup.

Tip: you can even lift the Samba conf file that Sage's gentoo install uses from here: http://download.sagetv.com/linuxweb/smb.conf

Neil

[bradlewa]

sorry i should have specified that i was using gentoo (the standard sage install). but that's the info i was after (that samba and ssh are already installed, and that there's a preset config file from sage). would there have been anyway for me to know that otherwise? meaning, is it listed somewhere that sage provides a samba file?

[bradlewa]

ok, i have ssh working, but am having some trouble with samba. is it pre-installed on the standard sagetv gentoo distro? because i couldn't find it anywhere. i've tried to emerge it, but one of the servers gentoo is trying to download from keeps timing out. is this normal? again, i have very little clue as to what i am doing, so i don't know if this is normal or if i am doing something wrong. for reference, the file it's having trouble getting is samba-3-gentoo-0.3.13.tar.bz2.

[_Demo_]

Try executing emerge sync before trying to do emerge samba.

_Demo_

[Motofreak75]

Originally Posted by bradlewa

ok, i have ssh working, but am having some trouble with samba. is it pre-installed on the standard sagetv gentoo distro? because i couldn't find it anywhere. i've tried to emerge it, but one of the servers gentoo is trying to download from keeps timing out. is this normal? again, i have very little clue as to what i am doing, so i don't know if this is normal or if i am doing something wrong. for reference, the file it's having trouble getting is samba-3-gentoo-0.3.13.tar.bz2.

I let the install script run for about 30 minutes and it final found a server (after 30 different ftp site) that had the samba files needed for the oem install.

[bradlewa]

Demo, good tip. I got the same advice over on the Gentoo boards. It did the trick. I guess the portage (which I still don't know what that is) was asking for an outdated samba version.