I use Kubuntu but there shouldn't be any fundamental difference. I do
have Samba installed and fuse and gadmin-samba. After I have set up my
shared folders I always deactivate, reread and active in gadmin-samba.
Then it tells me that the inactive server is winbindd. To enable that
I found by trial and error that it requires a sudo winbindd in a
terminal.

Only after I have gone through this complicated routine can I browse
my local network. It seems like a lot of trouble and I'd welcome
suggestions for an easier way but it seems that most of the people
here don't use or want to be on a LAN.

We have a mixed LAN here - Ubuntu / WinXP / NAS drive and the easiest
way I've found of accessing shared folders in Ubuntu is to use the IP
address directly and bookmarking this in 'Places'. After that, just a
click on the bookmark opens the share. This does really need fixed IP
addresses of course but we always run those anyway.

Places / Computer / Go / Location

E.G. smb://192.168.0.166/ gets me to the Buffalo NAS drive

LAC> I'd welcome suggestions for an easier way but it seems that most
LAC> of the people here don't use or want to be on a LAN.

Thank you for your helpful replies. Perhaps I am carrying over some
unrealistic expectations on networking from my Windows and NetWare days,
which I leave behind with absolutely no regrets.

I use Kubuntu and KDE on Linux Mint.

What I am looking for is the ability to browse the network and copy/
transfer files between any two machines, in other words, full two-way peer
to peer sharing. Naturally I'm looking for this to be stable, reliable and
seamless. There are no Windows machines on my net at present, but if they
could be added it would be a bonus. So far the stability and reliability
have been unsatisfactory. As a (retired) network administrator I always
worked towards "five nines" reliability, i. e. 99.999% uptime. With NetWare
(much as I hated Novell) we achieved it.

I guess this is just a hobby now, but I'm sure it can be done with Kubuntu,
and I will keep working on it. Maybe my next step should be NFS sharing.
I'll let you know of any breakthroughs.

Exactly as it works here using IP address and bookmarking. All shares
on the target system are visible and any lack of access is always a
permissions problem on the system sharing the resource. Even WinXP
seems to like that method and rarely locks me out - it's invariably a
problem with WinXP which a re-boot cures ( as ever !! ).

LAC> What I am looking for is the ability to browse the network and
LAC> copy/ transfer files between any two machines, in other words,
LAC> full two-way peer to peer sharing.

I'm glad it works so well for you on Ubuntu. For some reason it
doesn't work well for me on Kubuntu. Maybe I'm missing something
obvious but it has me puzzled.

I created the ip address bookmarks in the Dolphin File Browser and
nothing would connect. Every other machine timed out - very quickly.
What I had to do to get access was go to each machine. Stop Samba in
gadmin-samba, restart Samba, which then showed winbindd (2 d's) as an
inactive server. On the CLI sudo winbindd and the password brought
Samba to life. I've just done this on 3 machines and I'm sure the last
one, our Home Theatre, connected to the large screen TV as monitor,
will be the same.

Can you see anything I'm doing wrong, short of using Kubuntu insteasd
of Ubuntu? I've got this routine down to a fine art over several years
and it always works, but it shouldn't be necessary and that's what I'm
wrestling with...

Are all the systems running Kubuntu, and which version(s) ? Also have
you installed gadmin-samba on all of them ? I did read that this
package is no longer supported on the Debian platform and that might
be part of the problem ?

LAC> I've just done this on 3 machines and I'm sure the last one, our
LAC> Home Theatre, connected to the large screen TV as monitor, will
LAC> be the same.

Two machines are running Kubuntu 11.10, one Kubuntu 10.04 and two Linux
Mint 10, KDE. All have Samba and gadmin-Samba installed. Gadmin-Samba may
no longer be developed but it is in the repositories so hopefully that
means it's approved and stable.

I wonder if there is a bug somewhere that causes gadmin-Samba to fall back
to unencrypted passwords if the connection times out? That is the only
clue I've found and it isn't always found when the connection fails. The
stop, restart, run winbindd routine always fixes it, sometimes after
changing back the passwords to "encrypted", (default).

I really want (K)Ubuntu to be every bit as functional as Windows and this
is the only place where it has let me down. I'd like to think there is a
simple fix, or that I've made a configuration error... It is an issue that
I've been struggling with for at least 4 years.

Only way to determine it that's the root problem would be to remove
gadmin-samba on all systems and see if sharing works any better.

Also have you installed Samba4 in place of Samba ? That package isn't
meant for production systems, not fully developed yet.

LAC> I wonder if there is a bug somewhere that causes gadmin-Samba to
LAC> fall back to unencrypted passwords if the connection times out?

Yes, it's the original Samba, not Samba4.

I have a feeling that if I remove gadmin-samba all my shares will be
gone since they are defined by it in smb.conf. Nevertheless I will try
it and let you know.There is a sharing option in the properties of
files/folders in Kubuntu. That would still work but it wouldn't be as
neat as centralized administration from the gadmin console.

Know what you mean but a neat admin interface is only useful if it
works FWIW - using bookmarks does work well here and perhaps
without gadmin-samba they'll work for you too ? If not, removing and
re-installing gadmin-samba might get it working better anyway.