sharing an external drive over nfs

[sabersong]

I'm using Kubuntu 9.10 on two computers. Computer A has a USB hard drive attached to it, formatted ext3 and mounted to a folder in computer A's home folder. Computer B can access computer A's home folder using NFS, but when opening the folder to which the external drive is mounted, the folder shows empty.

I have a laptop which was using Vista, and was able to connect to both computers using Samba. It was able to access the files on the external drive without difficulty. But the hard drive on the laptop failed and needs to be replaced. I really can't afford to pay $300 for Windows, so I need to be able to access that external drive over NFS so I can install Kubuntu on the laptop when I replace the hard drive.

Can someone help me with this?

[twoHats]

I'm using Kubuntu 9.10 on two computers. Computer A has a USB hard drive attached to it, formatted ext3 and mounted to a folder in computer A's home folder. Computer B can access computer A's home folder using NFS, but when opening the folder to which the external drive is mounted, the folder shows empty.

I have a laptop which was using Vista, and was able to connect to both computers using Samba. It was able to access the files on the external drive without difficulty.

I guess i have to ask, why not use Samba? I believe nfs is sort of over the hill security wise etc.

[sabersong]

Actually, I was having a lot of trouble with Samba. My Windows laptop could access both my Kubuntu desktops, but they couldn't access the laptop or each other, and I couldn't share the printer at all. SO I installed nfs, and the kubuntu computers started talking to each other and sharing the printer with no trouble. That's why I use nfs instead of Samba.

[twoHats]

sounds reasonable ... good luck.

If you go back to the Samba idea, perhaps you need to designate one of the computers (the one with the HD?) as a server. I have that setup here with 1 Vista laptop, two linux/vista laptops and a linux server, and it is sweet.

Here is a link to some config info:

Introduction to Samba

[TaZMAniac]

Hi Sabersong,

I haven't used NFS but it sounds like you may have a permissions problem with that external drive.
You said that when you try to access that external drive from computer B, you see an empty folder.

Go to computer A and right click on the external drive folder and see what the permissions are set to for that folder. You may have to add computer B's user into your Users and Groups found under Administration.
Then give that user permission to access the drive in the folder permissions tab.
You may want to take a look at this page for help;
How to share files and folders in Ubuntu – Simple Help

Another program available for Ubuntu that I have heard is easy to set up and allows file sharing is called giver. You can read about it here;
Simple Desktop File Sharing with Giver | Tombuntu

Good luck and don't give up. Ubuntu is different then Windows but once you get a grasp on it, you will never go back.