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Asked: 2012-12-22 00:33:19 +0800 CST

Cannot connect to windows share using computer name

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I have Ubuntu 12.10 installed in VMware Workstation as a guest. The VM's network adapter is set up as "bridge", so effectively, it should look like it is connected directly to the switch all my computers are connected to.

I am trying to make the VM connect to shares on the host. The host has a computer name of MyComp and workgroup of WORKGROUP. The host is running Windows 7 64-bit.

In Nautilus, I choose File > Connect to server. I then set it to Windows Share and try to connect to my computer. If I set MyComp as the server name, the connection will fail with Failed to retrieve share list from server. If I set it to the ip address 192.168.1.7, then it works.

I have done a bit of research and discovered that maybe it is because I don't have nmbd installed on the system. However, I believe it is part of the samba packages, which I do have:

user@ubuntu:~$ sudo apt-get install samba-common-bin smbclient samba-common
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
samba-common is already the newest version.
smbclient is already the newest version.
samba-common-bin is already the newest version.

Is there anyway I can connect to the windows share using the computer name?

windows-7

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Finally found a solution to this after fiddling with some other things.

    1. Install Winbind if it has not been installed:

      sudo aptitude install winbind

    2. Edit /etc/nsswitch.conf and change hosts: files dns to hosts: files wins dns.

    You may after to restart your system after changing this.

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