Give Permission to access your resources XP Home

This page is for Windows XP Home or Windows XP Professional
using "Simple File Sharingl
(there is a slightly different procedure for Windows 95/98/ME and for Windows 2000
Windows XP professional without using Simple Fle Sharing )
.

you need to logon as "Administrator" or "Standard User" ("Power User") for this step !

You have installed your network card and checked the network configuration.

The question is now: do you only want to connect from your system to another computer on
the network or do you want to allow other computers also to access resources on your system ?
(a network resource is either a complete disk, a folder with all files and subdirectories or a printer)

Unlike Windows95/98/ME, where you need to install "File-and-Print Sharing" as part of the
check/adjusting of the network configuration, Winddows XP has "File-and-Print Sharing"
installed by default.

You need now to decide, to which part of your computer other system should have access:
which part of your system to SHARE.

You can give access to a complete disk on your computer or to just a folder.
You can allow other system to print on your printer.

Microsoft has changed on Windows XP the method of Sharing a disk/folder
to a new method, called "Simple File Sharing".
On Windows XP Home, you must use "Simple File Sharing".
On Windows XP Professional, you can switch off "Simple File Sharing",
but you can select to use "Simple File Sharing" , to work like on XP Home.

for a disk to be shared (for example in "My Computer") ,right-click on the disk-icon
to get the context / popup-menu : Select "Sharing and Security...."

Compared to previous version of Windows,
Microsoft has put in much more information
to warn users on security issues, and this is
an example : Sharing a complete disk can
be a security problem.

Sharing only folders is more
selective and not such a high
security problem :

Once you have selected the
folder to be shared, make
either a Right-click to get the
Context/Pop-up menu and
select "Sharing and Security..."
or select from the
"File and Folder Tasks"
(on the left side) to :
"Share this folder"

	Different to previous versions of Windows, where it is sufficient to just have File and Print sharing installed to be able to share, Windows XP suggests to run first the "Network Setup Wizard"
	If you know how to handle later the setup of the firewall, you can select to share files without running the Network Setup Wizard : - confirm again, that you just like to enable File Sharing and you skip the Wizard. However, if you are new to networking and not sure about the security issues, it is a good idea to use the Network Setup Wizard:

Once you have run the Network Setup Wizard,
the checkbox to share become active :

I share my drive, define the name to be displayed
on other systems as the Sharename and I allow
other network users to change my files.

Once a disk or folder is shared, the icon will show it via the "holding hand :"

Next Step:

Network Neighborhood / My Network Places