Using Samba with WinXP

[richb at pioneer.ci.net]

I wrote:
> The restricted ones are the ones I'm having
> difficulty with.  Even the unrestricted ones should be authenticated, though:
> without authentication, I can't create new files on them.

OK, a few more hours of tinkering and I have two more tidbits to share
for the archives here:

1) One of the better comments I could find through a web search comes
   from Benjamin Grimes.  Read it here: http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winxp/r1009126072
   He reminds you to re-generate via 'smbpasswd -a' all the user logins
   after making changes to the domain login settings.  (This was not my
   issue but it might be for someone else.)

2) By default, WinXP does not ask you to create passwords for login time.
   (It has a nifty "switch user" feature which works well enough without
   setting up user passwords.)  HOWEVER, if you don't configure a login
   password, you may have trouble authenticating to a Samba server.  The
   authentication dialog box which comes up when you attempt to map a
   drive or access a network resource performs its authentication DIFFERENTLY
   than if you're logged in to the local machine with a password (that
   matches the one on the domain server).

So, I can now access my Samba shares if I configure the XP box for full
password authentication (i.e. you have to supply a password along with your
username at boot time, something which is NOT required under Win98, you can
have password-less usernames on a Win98 unit, and still be able to access
password-protected shares).  It's still a mystery to me why it won't
authenticate at a password dialog box.

-rich