Create a share with no password needed

[chienpourri]

Hello all,

I have 3 other NAS boxes from different manufacturers (D-Link and LG) and with them I've had no problem to create "open" shares. Meaning shares where no username neither password is needed to access the data with full rights. I need this as one of the systems I use is XBMC and it's super long to enter a username / password using the TV remote... This is in a 100% Windows 7 based environment.

So is there a trick to achieve this? I only have the admin account and it seems to want the admin username / password before I can access the "Public" folder which is the only one I have shared from the default ones.

[ruben00]

Go into "Sharing Setup"

Pick a Share like "Downloads" and allow "guest" to either "read-only" or "read-write"

The guest account should allow anoymous (no user/pass) access to that share

[chienpourri]

Ha! Ok, thanks... but I deleted the "guest" account. Now, when I want to recreate it, it asks for an obligatory password...

Will the guest account come back if I do a hard reset of the Javelin? I don't mind having to restart my settings as there is no data on any drives as of yet.

[chienpourri]

Ok I ended up doing a hard reset of the Javelin.... the Guest account is back but apparently the default password is "guest" as well. I'll try to do as I found in another post (telnet pluging + reset password using command line).

[chienpourri]

Ok well there must be something I am missing... I was able to use the rooter plugin, then reset the guest password to "blank". However, I still wasn't able to access the share whitout inputting a password, it would not accept anything. I am unable to login as "guest" under the web interface, it forces me to enter a password. I was able to login to the dashboard application using "guest" and no password, but it couldn't detect any share.

Then I restarted the Javelin and the password was back to the default "guest" value.

I also tried to create another account, and same thing: as soon as the password is blanked out it won't let me access anything.

Is there anything else I can try, using the telnet command line, to make the "public" folder on Volume1 and "public2" folder on Volume2 accessible by anyone whitout Windows prompting for a username or password to access the share. Basically an "anonymous" full rights share is what I want.

I am so dissapointed, so far this is my 4th NAS and the only one with this weird behavior! :(

[ruben00]

Seems to me like it won't be possible, all the config changes you need to make to the smb.conf file (http://amazingrando.wordpress.com/2007/06/03/share-folders-via-samba-without-a-password-easy/) wont survive a reboot or a config change from the GUI

[chienpourri]

So basically you're saying that out of the box, there is absolutely no possibility to create an unprotected share? In any way or form? So I'm not the master of my own data then...

Thanks for the link, last time I used linux was over 10 years ago so I don't remember anything ;)

But as you say, even if I make the changes the file will be reverted back to its default value after a reboot. So what we need is a plugin that would allow us to change the smb.conf file that is restored.

[ruben00]

Nothing is Impossible....Well, Almost Nothing :)

If you dont care about the GUI, and you plan to do all your management via CLI, then you could add a line to the rooter plugin to copy your own version of the smb.conf file from like \VOLUME1\Upload to \etc\config\samba\lib\ I believe, and restart samba after the NAS starts up. You also have to worry about making the smb.conf file read-only so that your changes won't be overwritten by the GUI

[chienpourri]

Ha sounds like a good idea... but I don't have too much time to work it out! Plus I believe this should be offered build-in and not through a hacked add-on ;)

I actually opened a support ticket with Patriot asking them about this specific issue, I'll see what they answer back.

[ruben00]

sounds good. Let us know how it turns out and what fix they Patriot Support gave you!!

[chienpourri]

Well they said it's not possible, so I just closed the ticket. I found a way to have my devices remember the password so I don't have to type it in everytime... it's the best I can do but it seems to work out just fine.