James Harris <james.harri...@gmail.com> [JH]:

JH> Is there a good way to sync a directory hierarchy unidirectionally
JH> from Linux to Windows? There must be one, surely...!?

NFS perhaps?
(assuming that your boxes are on a fast LAN)

On Mon, 17 May 2021 18:05:13 +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote:

> James Harris <james.harri...@gmail.com> [JH]:
>
> JH> Is there a good way to sync a directory hierarchy unidirectionally
> JH> from Linux to Windows? There must be one, surely...!?
>
> NFS perhaps?

Or Samba.

> (assuming that your boxes are on a fast LAN)

--
Lew Pitcher
"In Skills, We Trust"

On 17/05/2021 17:24, Lew Pitcher wrote:
> On Mon, 17 May 2021 18:05:13 +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote:
>
>> James Harris <james.harri...@gmail.com> [JH]:
>>
>> JH> Is there a good way to sync a directory hierarchy unidirectionally
>> JH> from Linux to Windows? There must be one, surely...!?
>>
>> NFS perhaps?
>
> Or Samba.
>
>> (assuming that your boxes are on a fast LAN)

I presume you guys mean to share part of the Windows machine's
filesystem so I could run commands against it from Linux, and that's a
good idea. I've got it set up - and apparently working well.

I couldn't find much support for NFS in my newly reset copy of Windows
10 Home but I had success with CIFS.

Here's the mount line in fstab.

//h9.scl.internal./Users/jh /o/jh/host-h9 cifs
cred=/o/jh/.cred/h9-cifs,uid=jh,gid=jh

The Windows system's name is h9. The above mounts h9's Windows share on
Linux's ~/host-h9. The credentials file is just

username=...
password=...

with the appropriate values.

One thing I should point out for anyone who is trying to do the same is
that although I set the credentials file as chmod 600 it is still plain
text and can be read by root and by any backup software. Therefore for
security I used a different password scheme from normal on the Windows
machine and in the credentials file.

I've got a few other things to do - including working out which of the
many rsync switches are needed - but so far it's looking good. :-)

--
James Harris

On 18/05/2021 10:27, James Harris wrote:
> On 17/05/2021 17:24, Lew Pitcher wrote:
>> On Mon, 17 May 2021 18:05:13 +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote:
>>
>>> James Harris <james.harri...@gmail.com> [JH]:
>>>
>>> JH> Is there a good way to sync a directory hierarchy unidirectionally
>>> JH> from Linux to Windows? There must be one, surely...!?
>>>
>>> NFS perhaps?
>>
>> Or Samba.
>>
>>> (assuming that your boxes are on a fast LAN)
>
> I presume you guys mean to share part of the Windows machine's
> filesystem so I could run commands against it from Linux, and that's a
> good idea. I've got it set up - and apparently working well.
>
> I couldn't find much support for NFS in my newly reset copy of Windows
> 10 Home but I had success with CIFS.
>
> Here's the mount line in fstab.
>
> //h9.scl.internal./Users/jh /o/jh/host-h9 cifs
> cred=/o/jh/.cred/h9-cifs,uid=jh,gid=jh
>
> The Windows system's name is h9. The above mounts h9's Windows share on
> Linux's ~/host-h9. The credentials file is just
>
> username=...
> password=...
>
> with the appropriate values.
>
> One thing I should point out for anyone who is trying to do the same is
> that although I set the credentials file as chmod 600 it is still plain
> text and can be read by root and by any backup software. Therefore for
> security I used a different password scheme from normal on the Windows
> machine and in the credentials file.
>
> I've got a few other things to do - including working out which of the
> many rsync switches are needed - but so far it's looking good. :-)
>
>
I don't think Windows has ever supported NFS serving. And NFS clients
were few and far between.

It was always easier to use CIFS - the smb client...

--
Microsoft : the best reason to go to Linux that ever existed.

On Tue, 18 May 2021 10:27:44 +0100, James Harris wrote:

> On 17/05/2021 17:24, Lew Pitcher wrote:
>> On Mon, 17 May 2021 18:05:13 +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote:
>>
>>> James Harris <james.harri...@gmail.com> [JH]:
>>>
>>> JH> Is there a good way to sync a directory hierarchy unidirectionally
>>> JH> from Linux to Windows? There must be one, surely...!?
>>>
>>> NFS perhaps?
>>
>> Or Samba.
>>
>>> (assuming that your boxes are on a fast LAN)
>
> I presume you guys mean to share part of the Windows machine's
> filesystem so I could run commands against it from Linux,

Not me.

I suggest running Samba on your Linux machine, and using it to
export your "manipulated" directory to your Windows systems as
a new Windows "drive". With the proper Samba configuraion, you
can control access, so that only specific Windows systems can
access the exported directory, and that no (or select) Windows
user can write to it.

This way, your Windows users see a "share" drive that they can
read files directly from, or copy as required, and you contain
most of the administrivia (outside of the initial establishment
of the Windows share on the Windows side) to the Linux system.

> and that's a
> good idea. I've got it set up - and apparently working well.

[snip]

--
Lew Pitcher
"In Skills, We Trust"

The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> writes:

> I don't think Windows has ever supported NFS serving. And NFS clients
> were few and far between.

Windows XP had the "Windows Services for UNIX" which was rather the
opposite of what the name implies. Free from Microsoft, included an NFS
server and client among other things.

Windows 7 had NFS, at least client support but only in the Enterprise
and Kitchen Sink variants (or whatever it was called.) I remember I
considered buying an NFS client from LabF but didn't get around to
it. Seemed senseless to pay for something that could be replaced with
free CIFS or many other free things and my need was small anyways.

I don't remember how it was with Vista and 8 and NFS support since I
never used those much.

Today Windows 10 Pro includes NFS client support. Still with an ass
backwards name of "Services for NFS".