2. Old-School Sharing
If homegroups are too simple (or too earthy-crunchy)
for your tastes, or if you simply want to share files and folders on
your Windows 7–based PCs with PCs that are running earlier versions of
Windows, fear not: you can still access the old-school network-based
sharing technologies that have been available in previous Windows
versions for years. In fact, they work much like they did in both
Windows XP and Vista: you can choose between a simple, wizard-based
sharing mechanism or a slightly more complicated, but much more capable
(and, let's face it, really old school) method.
NOTE
By default, Windows 7 is configured so that
folder sharing requires password protection. For example, if you
configured a user named Paul with the password 123 on a computer named
PC-A and have likewise configured a user named Paul with no password (or
a different password) on a computer named PC-B, the user Paul on PC-B
won't be able to access any folders shared by Paul on PC-A unless he
provides the appropriate logon information when prompted. To bypass this
issue, it's best to use passwords for all accounts on all PCs and use
the same password when you configure identically named accounts on
different PCs.
2.1. Sharing a Folder: The Wizard-Based Approach
Microsoft's wizard-based approach to folder sharing
is simple enough. Navigating with Windows Explorer, locate and select
the folder you'd like to share on your home network. Then click the
Share with button in the toolbar, followed by Specific people. The File
Sharing wizard, shown in Figure 8, will appear.
In the first stage of the wizard, you set the
permission level for each user configured on the system, and remove
those users to whom you do not wish to give access. By default, you are
configured with Owner permissions, while all other users are configured
with Read permissions.
NOTE
What's missing, by the way, is the notion of "all
users." To give blanket permission to anyone to access a share, you
need to access the drop-down box to the left of the Add button and then
select Everyone (All Users in This List).
The following permission types are available:
Owner:
This is essentially admin-level permissions, and you are free to view,
add, edit, or delete any shared file, as well as configure or remove the
folder share.
Read/Write:
Users with this permission level can view, add, edit, or delete any
shared file. (This permission level was called Co-owner in Windows
Vista.)
Read: Users with this permission level can view shared files but not add, edit, or delete them.
Once you're done configuring permissions, click the
Share button and you're good to go. To change sharing permissions or
stop sharing the folder, select it again, choose Share with and then
Specific people, and then choose the appropriate option from the File
Sharing wizard, which will now resemble Figure 9.
2.2. Advanced Sharing
The File Sharing wizard works well enough, but if
you've been sharing folders with Windows for a while now, as we have,
you may actually be more comfortable with Windows 7's alternative
sharing UI, which very closely resembles classic file sharing from
Windows XP. To access this interface, locate the folder you'd like to
share, right-click, and choose Properties. Next, click the Sharing tab,
shown in Figure 10.
If you click the Share button, you'll see the
now-familiar File Sharing wizard. Instead, click Advanced Sharing. This
launches the Advanced Sharing dialog, which is very similar to the
Sharing tab of a folder's Properties window in Windows XP (when classic
file sharing is enabled, as it is by default in Windows XP
Professional). The Advanced Sharing dialog, shown in Figure 11, assumes you know what you're doing, but it's very easy to use.
To share a folder this way, select the option titled
Share this folder. Then, accept or edit the share name and click the
Permissions button to display the Permissions window. From here you can
set the permission level for users and groups. By default, only the
Everyone group, which represents all user accounts on the system, is
present, but you can click Add => Advanced => Find Now to choose other users and groups individually if needed. Click OK when you are done.
NOTE
Advanced Sharing provides a number of features
that aren't available via the File Sharing wizard, and that's why it's
good to know about. One is a limit on how many people can be connected
simultaneously to the share. Windows 7 limits the number of users who
can simultaneously connect to the PC to 10. But you can reduce the
number of connections to a given folder in the Advanced Sharing window.
(You cannot, however, raise the limit beyond 10.)
Another unique feature of Advanced Sharing is the
capability to configure folder caching, which determines whether
connected users can cache the contents of shared folders locally for use
offline. You access this functionality via the Caching button in
Advanced Sharing.
While some people will no doubt have very specific
sharing needs, most simply want to open up a portal from which they can
share files with others or with other PCs. In this case, Advanced
Sharing is actually quite a bit quicker than the wizard.
3. Sharing Printers
While network-attached printers are becoming more
common these days, many people still use printers that are directly
connected to an individual PC, typically by a USB cable. In such cases,
it's nice to be able to print to that printer from other PCs on the home
network. Although you could temporarily unplug these printers and plug
them into a different machine, an easier way is available. You can share
these printers so that other PCs on the network can access them.
NOTE
For this to work, the PC to which the printer is
connected must be turned on, and not asleep, in hibernation, or shut
down. You don't need to leave it logged on with a particular user
account, however.
In Windows 7, you share printers via
HomeGroup sharing. HomeGroup sharing is simple and requires you to just
check the Printers box in the HomeGroup control panel. Simple, no?
