Accessing your DAMTP home directory from the Laptop Network

Contents:

  1. MacOSX - wired only
  2. Linux (or some other UNIX systems) - wired only
  3. Windows - wired only
  4. Using ssh - wireless and wired connections

Restrictions on access

From the current wireless Lapnet setup only forms of access which are encrypted over ssh are permitted.

The same is also true of access from Lapwing, Eduroam and in fact from any network which is considered external to the site.

Departmental windows accounts

Accessing your home directory via samba requires a departmental Windows account.

If you need a windows account or cannot remember your Windows password please contact the departmental computing helpdesk.

Accessing your DAMTP home directory from MacOSX - wired connections only

To view your DAMTP home directory via a laptop running MacOSX. In the Finder select the "Go" menu -> "Connect to Server...", then in the Server Address field you can use one of afp or smb:

  • For afp 
         afp://afp-serv.damtp.cam.ac.uk
    A login box will popup asking for you Name and password. This requires your DAMTP login name and password. Make sure that registered user is selected.
    Next you will be asked to select the volume you wish to mount, select the one which is your username by double clicking it.
  • For smb 
         smb://samba.maths.cam.ac.uk/username
    For smb there will be a slightly different login dialog asking for the Workgroup or Domain, Name and password. For our current setup the Domain should not matter. Enter your Departmental Windows username and password.

In either case an icon will appear on your desktop - a globe with your username underneath, double clicking on this opens a window with your DAMTP home directory files and directories inside.

To see your home directory via a terminal/shell window:

     cd /Volumes/loginname

Accessing your DAMTP home directory from Linux (or variant) - wired only

Decide where you want to mount the directory in this case /mnt/home. If this directory does not exist then create it (as the superuser)

     mkdir /mnt/home

Set the variable U to your username and copy the line starting with smbmount. Say the user is spq201 then

     U=spq201
     smbmount //samba.maths.cam.ac.uk/$U /mnt/home -o username=$U

You will be promted for a password - the password you must give is your Maths windows password, as you are using the Maths Samba server.

Your home directory is now mounted at /mnt/home. So that cd /mnt/home will show your DAMTP home directory.

Accessing your DAMTP home directory from a computer running Microsoft Windows - wired only

To view your DAMTP home directory via a laptop running Windows

In a command window type:

     net use N: \\samba.maths.cam.ac.uk\username /user:mathsdom\username

You need to supply your Maths Windows password and account name when accessing a share from the laptop network.

For more detailed instructions check the windows network drive page.

If you frequently connect to departmental windows computers you will notice some differences.
The NETBIOS names like samba or winsam are not visible on the laptop network.

Unlike departmental windows computers you need to provide your windows username and password because your computer is not part of the Maths Windows domain, and you do not authenticate to the domain when you log on. If you are logged on to a domain member computer on the main network your credentials are passed automatically when you access the share.

Access via ssh - wired and wireless

Both AFP and SMB can be tunnelled over ssh to provide secure access from any network. On Linux and MacOSX this can be done by setting up an ssh tunnel first and then pointing the client at the local end of the tunnel. On Windows it is also possible to tunnel SMB access but somewhat more steps are needed - please ask us if you need help setting this up.

On both MacOSX and Linux you can also use sshfs which is a fuse filesystem layer which will work talking to pretty much any ssh server. Most modern Linux distributions will include fuse and sshfs packages and the MacOSX version can be downloaded easily enough.

Just transferring files via ssh

Applications exist which will use ssh (scp/sftp etc) to allow copying of files betwen your laptop and DAMTP. Some graphical clients are winscp (Windows) fugu (MacOSX), nautilus (Linux)

Or for most systems you can simply use a command-line tool such as sftp, scp or rsync.

See the ssh and rsync manuals for details since there are many options you may want to use.

Useful Links: