CIFS Windows

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The official documentation is at: http://docs.alfresco.com

CIFSWindows3.3

Table of Contents

• 1 Note to the Reader


• 2 Introduction


• 3 Instructions


• 4 Troubleshooting


• 5 Other Windows Versions

Note to the Reader

This article refers to Alfresco 3.3 & 3.4 and testing was performed with a vanilla Windows 2008 R2 x64 and a vanilla Windows 2003 server both of which were not configured in a domain (e.g. domain=WORKGROUP). Client side testing was performed on the server as well as separate Windows 7 and Windows XP clients.

Introduction

This page lists instructions for configuring SMB/CIFS on a Windows 2003 or 2008 server.

Instructions

1. If installing on Windows 2008 x64, make sure that Alfresco is using the 64 bit version of Java. The full windows installs, install the 32 bit version, so this needs to be updated.
   
   
2. Add the following lines to the alfresco-global.properties file (if alfresco is installed in c:\Alfresco it will be found here - C:\alfresco\tomcat\shared\classes). The domain should be the domain your windows machine is part of. Since the server shown wasn't part of an external domain, the following was set to WORKGROUP. The serverName specifies the name of the host.



  cifs.enabled=true
  cifs.domain=WORKGROUP
  cifs.serverName=${localname}A
  cifs.hostannounce=true



3. Make sure NetBIOS over TCP/IP is enabled.



(Note that this step can be skipped if installed on a local WindowsXP computer (not server))


tcpip_properties_for_adapter.jpg


advanced_tcpip_settings.jpg




4. Start Alfresco (or restart if it was already running).


5. A user should now be able to access the share - \\alf33enta\Alfresco  (where alf33ent was the hostname of the machine where Alfresco is installed - this is the serverName parameter). NOTE: Occasionally, there were problems correctly resolving the name. If, instead, the IP address was used (e.g. \\10.1.0.22\Alfresco), the connection was quickly made.


6. Each user (on client and server) should add a shortcut to the Alfresco folder. To add a shortcut perform the following steps: 1) Go to Control Panel and select Network Connections 2) On the left pane under Other Places select My Network Places 3) On the left pane under Network Tasks select Add a network place 4) In the Internet or network address box input (per this example) \\alf33enta\Alfresco.  Note that the connection will disconnect frequently and a reset of the network settings will be required as explained below under Troubleshooting. 
   

Please note that Windows 7 is slow to connect if the user logging in is not logged in with a username that is the same as their Alfresco user name. A delay of 30 seconds may be seen if that is the case.

Troubleshooting

If this doesn't seem to work correctly, try running nbtstat -n on the server. It should display something like this where the serverName parameter can be seen (in this case the localhost was named ALF33ENT and the serverName parameter was set as above with a trailing A on the end).

nbtstat_alfresco_on.jpg

If you are running Windows 2003 and get an error like Failed to access NetBT Driver - NetBT may not be loaded, you may not be logged in as an administrator. You must be an administrator to run nbtstat. If you are still getting this error, you  might want to reset your network settings. You can do this by running the command netsh int ip reset c:\reset.log and rebooting. Before doing that - Please note that this will reset your TCP/IP settings and your IP address will be set to DHCP if it was static before. Therefore, make sure you copy down your static IP addresses and nameserver settings and have a way to connect back to the server. After the reboot, you can reset your static IP and name servers.

Other Windows Versions

The same general installation will work with Windows 2003 as well with the exception of the first step of needing 64 bit java.
The same general installation will work with Windows XP Professional with the exception of the enabling NetBIOS over TCP/IP.

Tcpip_properties_for_adapter.jpg ‏54 KB

Advanced_tcpip_settings.jpg ‏47 KB

Nbtstat_alfresco_on.jpg ‏20 KB