The shared Network drive solution revisted
So after a series of posts exploring a sensible, free-from-time-wasting way of sharing files, I’ve now found a better way.
I overlooked the whole Fuse and SSHFS situation. So now we can to connect to the server in a decent way (not using some dumb SFTP program) try:
Mac OSX. Go to This Google code site, download and install all 3 programs there. Then you can either use their gui to connect to an SSH server or this command:
/Applications/sshfs.app/Contents/Resources/sshfs-static gobisoft@snow.gobisoft.net:/virtual/samba ~/tmp -ovolname=gobisoft
Feel free to modify this are you see fit. If you’re on OSX Tiger / above and you’ve installed MacFuse, feel free to make an Automator script which you can run on startup.
The Linux commands should be similar. Try looking here.
On windows you’ll need to download and install and eventually pay for a program called SFTP Drive. Which does the same thing.
The reason why we use SFTP drive on Windows is because it’s easier and faster than using the Windows networking options I’ve discussed in previous posts.
Business:
We should think about developing free product that provides the same integration to Windows as SFTP Drive. For this we should be looking at creating either a Windows NT IFS driver, or possibly doing some trickery with an SFTP program and the old subst command from the DOS days that’s still in Windows. The other alternative would be working out how network filesystems a la UNC Network shares work in Windows, just like the people the folks did on SFTP drive.
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms977158.aspx
Now this solution is great for a corporate shared system without the hassle of setting up a VPN that runs at decent speeds over ADSL, but the Virtual Machine SMB way of doing things can also lead to a product which could enable you to run other Windows domain services (like Domain logon over the net) without using a traditional VPN.