Techniques for Geeks

Have you ever wanted to set a computer up in one location so that you could access it via the Internet from another -- and without having to buy any additional software or install a web server or FTP server or anything like that. For example, you might want to share a directory containing documents you and your coworkers are working on, or perhaps you want to give your associate access to your hard drive. Of course you have to be careful here to make sure that you password protect the drives you are sharing, as you don't want unauthorized users to be able to access your data using this little trick. Fortunately, it's very easy to share a drive and specify a password. Just right click a directory you want to share, choose "Sharing" and specify a password. I suggest making the password a combination of letters and numbers or include one or more upper-case characters -- they're much harder to crack. I also suggest Okaying this procedure with your boss if you're planning on remotely accessing a machine at work.

Here's how to access the shared drive or directory on your networked computer. Okay, let's log in!

First, you need to know the IP address of the computer you want to access remotely. -your associate can find this by typing "ipconfig" into his or her computer's DOS box, which you can get to by selecting the MS DOS prompt item in the Programs area of your Windows Start Menu.  Then, from your remote location, we can use the Start Menu's Find command to find a computer. Or, if you prefer, you can do a context click -- that's a right click -- over your computer's "Network Neigborhood" icon and select the "Find Computer" item to get the same dialog, shown here. Then type the IP address of your associate's computer, which they've emailed you or told you over the telephone, along with whatever password you'll need to access it.

When the computer shows up in the find list (it will take a moment), double click it to open a new  window for that computer's IP address showing all its network shared resources.

Then double click the share you want to access (in this example, both  the C drive and the "Desktop Directory" are shared, we're going to access the "C drive") and you are presented an "Enter Network Password" dialog. After entering the correct username/password, you will be presented with the contents of the shared "C drive."

That's it.

How you set the password, username, and user rights for each share is, of course, different for each operating system. You must, of course, have  TCP/IP networking (on each machine) correctly configured for this procedure to succeed. If the machines can network locally via TCP/IP, then the remote config should work. The above examples describe Windows 98. ….With techniques for Geeks, I'm Graeme Bennett.