Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[HairyWill]

Now at version 0.65
<edit date="14/02/20010">
I'm updating this post for historical accuracy. The latest version of pnethood I released is 0.65. I believe that there is a later version circulating with a small patch to the mount command to support UTF-8.

A number of puplets and Barry's current development releases are now using Patriots lameSMBxplorer instead. It is unlikely that pnethood will be developed further so if neither pnethood or lameSMBxplorer work for you it is probably better to report a bug against lameSMBxplorer.
</edit>

This GUI is for mounting windows samba shares on your puppy pc. It is intended to be simpler to use than linneighborhood especially for use on small home networks.
The screenshot below shows pnethood 0.5 with an error message visible. For those interested in visual friparary the screenshot was taken in pup214R using the debian red gtk theme with jwm set to match.



Project Status

Depends On:

* smbclient
* smbmount
* rox (filer needed to show open a window once share is connected)
* rxvt (needed to view the log)
* (all of the above are included in the basic iso for recent puppys)
* nbtscan (included in the pet)

Done:

* separate show/connect/disconnect buttons
* entry in the network menu
* separate tabs for each machine
* separate authentication details for each server
* rescans server with password if annoymous scan fails
* if password scan fails, checks mount to see if any shares are already mounted from that server
* inbuilt limit of 10 servers scanned, once this limit is exceeded you get a list of all servers and are asked to choose one.
* server and share names with spaces, dots and hyphens should work (only partially tested, may cause name collisions ie: my-server and my_server)
* servers may be specified by IP address
* scan includes every network interface, except ppp ones. I can't see why you would want to scan a ppp interface, it was taking ages and taking down my pptp vpn connection
* tabs are always shown for servers with shares that are currently mounted
* status, error handling and reporting (can't really be improved much without further user feedback)

To Do

* Allow user with more than 10 machines to select a new one without rescanning the entire network
* Handle servers with lots of shares. This will probably mean changing the interface implementation to use gtkdialog tree instead of buttons. This is a shame because I like the buttons.
* replace nbtscan with a scan that works with netbios over tcp/ip, this will probably just be a backup in case nbtscan produces nothing
* cifs support
* find a better way of dealing with passwords
* allow user to control how long nbtscan waits for servers to identify themselves
* move the mountpoint into /mnt somewhere

Known Bugs

Could run out of screen space for large numbers of shares.

nbtscan

This program relies on nbtscan for super faster scanning of your network to find machines to check for shares. Thanks to Alla Bezroutchko. Nbtscan relies on the NetBIOS protocol. If your windows computer is running Windows 2000 or above though it is possible that NetBIOS has been disabled. The default is for it to be enabled so it is likely that nbtscan will work.

If you are interested in building nbtscan yourself it is available here: http://www.inetcat.net/software/nbtscan.html

[BarryK]

So it doesn't need the Samba utilities at all?

[HairyWill]

[BarryK]

Ah, I've just realised something. Dingo has 'nmblookup', 'smbclient', 'smbmnt', 'smbmount', 'smbspool', 'smbumount'.

There is no 'smblookup' in the Samba package, I just checked the original full package.

Will, could you test something -- try creating a symlink smblookup to nmblookup, see if that makes Gfilemanager happy.

Ah, no, there may be a difference. See this package:
http://gnu.rtin.bz/directory/all/gsmbscanner.html

This site has a PHP script for smblookup:
https://trac.anl.gov/scavenger/browser/trunk/scanner/process/smblookup.php
...it just calls nmblookup, with certain parameters.

...so, we should be able to create a 'smblookup' also, to satisfy Gfilemanager, maybe get it from that gsmbscanner package.

[HairyWill]

now at version 0.2
As this is still very much in the testing phase it would be great to get any feedback even if it is just "it works" or "it doesn't work"

Barry
I have replied on your latest blog including patched src for gfilemanager which doesn't mount shares locally.

Bumped to version 0.21 to fix small but deadly bug in subnet calculation

Done
separate show/connect/disconnect buttons
label to show status
entry in the network menu

To Do
better status reporting
error handling and reporting
automated rescanning with password if anonymous scan fails
replace nbtscan with a scan that works with netbios over tcp/ip

Bugs
fails to scan if all the shares from my server are mounted
if mount fails buttons and label still indicate success (workaround click disconnect then try connect again)

version 0.21 received 21 downloads

[HairyWill]

Now at version 0.3
Some testing feedback would be really helpful especially to trap any complaints from servers that are not being handled properly. I've run out of error states on mine but there must be loads more.

Done:

* some error handling and reporting
* automatically caculates x.x.0.0/16 subnet to scan from your IP address
* status of each operation reported at bottom of screen
* separate tabs for each machine
* separate authentication details for each server
* rescans server with password if anonymous scan fails
* if password scan fails, checks mount to see if any shares are already mounted from that server

To Do

* Implement an inbuilt limit on the number of servers scanned, once this limit is exceeded it should just present a list of all servers and ask the user to choose one.
* Handle servers with lots of shares. This will probably mean changing the interface implementation to use gtkdialog tree instead of buttons. This is a shame because I like the buttons.
* better status reporting
* error handling and reporting
* replace nbtscan with a scan that works with netbios over tcp/ip

Known Bugs

Could run out of screen space for large numbers of shares or servers
Error not handled if you don't have an IP address
nbtscan described twice in the help

[disciple]

With a very simple Win98 network setup with no passwords or anything that works fine with linNeighborhood:

[HairyWill]

thanks for the reply
It currently expects a machine name not an ip address as a parameter
ie
pnethood "myserver"
good point though, I will implement handling of IP addresses

I haven't included for access to password-less shares yet so I expect the smbmount command string will be wrong for you. I need to crank down the security on my server to test this.

the output of

[disciple]

The output is 192.168 (My IP should be 192.168.2.33, the router is .2.1 and the "server" I want to connect to is .2.36)
I only have one active interface, but that is a good point to take into account

Your thing about line 23 doesn't make sense - maybe you have a later version that you've uploaded? Or is there a typo there?

[HairyWill]

Disciple I presume that as you are talking about win98 it is using raw netbios and not netbios over tcp/ip which is on my todo list.

What version of puppy are you running?
Does the server have a name, maybe
pnethood name
will work for you?

What output do you get for
nbtscan 192.168.2.0/24
if that works I would be interested to confirm that
nbtscan 192.168.0.0/16
does as well

regarding line 23 discussed above, yes, I pasted something in by mistake there shouldn't be "./usr/local/pnethood/pnethood" after "sed" but I think we've ruled that line out as the cause anyway.

pnethood sends debugging output to /tmp/pnethood-log
and the gui xml to /tmp/pnethood-gui

[Béèm]

I tried to use pnethood.
My configuration:
- Desktop (XP)
WiFi device at 192.168.1.2
ETH1394 device at 10.0.10
- Laptop (3.01)
WiFi device at 192.168.1.3
ETH1394 at 10.0.11

I started pnethood to do discovery of the network.
The window says scanning network please wait.
That windows stays forever until I push ok, but nothing is discovered.

Both PC sea each other with pin as well with the WiFi devices as with the ETH1394 devices.

Three pnethood processes are generated.
They stay there forever unless I kill them.

Then I tried LinNeighborhood on Puppy.
The Desktop is found, scanned and the shares found, which I can mount.

Where does it go wrong with pnethood?

[HairyWill]

Beem,
Thanks for the feedback.
The subnet calculation doesn't work properly if you have more than one working network interface, I will patch this in the next couple of days.

[Béèm]

Ok, HaiyWill, I'll watch this thread.

[davec51]

I have always used Lin Neighborhood with no trouble for my wired connection with an XP in the next room. I tried pnethood, but it wouldn't connect, no matter what I tried. I might add that I'm technically hopeless.

[disciple]

It works great if I use pnethood name
It does say