Need Help with Accessing Network Resources from Guest Account

Hi All:

I have three Windows XP Professional computers on my home wireless LAN:
DESKTOP, SERVER, LAPTOP all belonging to workgroup MSHOME. My main computer
is DESKTOP and I have three network shares physically located there in
addition to the default shared resources (SharedDocs). I also have a printer
attached to DESKTOP and shared on the network. LAPTOP is a machine which
sits in my living room in which I can access the network wirelessly from my
personal user account with admin rights.

My problem is that I also have the Guest account enabled on all computers,
but most importantly on LAPTOP. Friends and visitors in my home can go to my
laptop and into the Guest account - without password - and access the
internet. Great. However, I want them to also be able to access the
workgroup shared resources (music, pictures, video) and especially the
shared printer on DESKTOP. From Guest on LAPTOP, there is no access to
MSHOME and when trying to access the workgroup resources, a message appears
that Guest does not have sufficient access rights to MSHOME.

Makes sense out of the box. But I want to override this restriction and give
Guest on LAPTOP read/execute access to these shared resources including the
printer. I also don't want to put a password on the Guest account as I want
it freely accessible to anyone in my home. I've been trying to investigate
this issue on the web but it seems a bit over my head.

Can anyone help me? Thanks very much in advance.

Sid

Hi Mark:

Thanks for your response. However, I had already tried that. (I tried it
again just to make sure after your suggestion.) I add the user Guest to the
Share permissions across the network to both the shared files and the
printer on DESKTOP. (These resources then have an additional read permission
for DESKTOP/Guest although Everyone already has read and print permissions
for these resources as part of them being shared.)

The problem seems to be at a higher level than file and printer
permissions - with the permissions on the Workgroup itself. From the Guest
account on LAPTOP, if I try to view My Network Places, it shows there are no
network shares. If I try to View Network Computers from Guest on LAPTOP, I
get a message saying "MSHOME is not accessible. You might not have
permissions to access this network resource. Contact your system
admin.....". However, from another user account on the same computer LAPTOP,
I see all the computers on the network and all network file and printer
shares. I'm thinking if I can give Guest access permissions to the Workgroup
(which I don't know how to do), it may see the networked computers and the
network shares.

Any other suggestions/help would be appreciated. Thanks.


"Mark Dormer" <markd@mvpsx.org> wrote in message
news:Op2CiF4cEHA.3672@TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...

> Add the guest account to the share permissions and file system permissions
>
> To do so right click the shared folder select properties
> On the sharing tab, click permissions and add the guest account with read
> permission
> On the security tab add the guest account with read and execute

permissions

> (it will default to this anyway)
>
> Do the same with any other folders and printers you want to share
>
> Regards
> Mark Dormer
>
> "Sid Joyner" <sid_joyner@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:10gb96voc66n0e6@corp.supernews.com...

computers,

to

investigate

>
>

On Wed, 28 Jul 2004 10:35:17 -0700, Sid Joyner wrote:

> I'm thinking if I can give Guest access permissions to the Workgroup
> (which I don't know how to do), it may see the networked computers and the
> network shares.

May want to try another approach. Create a limited user and name it
Visitor. Then adjust permissions for that account.

Reason: Guest is a built-in account (not a typical user account). It is
purposefully designed to be very limited and difficult to alter. You can
use TweakUI to remove Guest from displaying on the welcome screen - that
might be less confusing for your visiting users and would help to direct
them to the Visitor account instead.

--
Sharon F
MS-MVP ~ Windows XP Shell/User

Thanks Sharon. Yeah, that should work fine if there is no other way to alter
the permissions across the network of the Guest account. There is more than
one way to skin a cat...

Thanks for the idea.

Sid

"Sharon F" <sharonfDEL@ETEmvps.org> wrote in message
news:uC2Ksl9dEHA.3988@tk2msftngp13.phx.gbl...

> On Wed, 28 Jul 2004 10:35:17 -0700, Sid Joyner wrote:
>

the

>
> May want to try another approach. Create a limited user and name it
> Visitor. Then adjust permissions for that account.
>
> Reason: Guest is a built-in account (not a typical user account). It is
> purposefully designed to be very limited and difficult to alter. You can
> use TweakUI to remove Guest from displaying on the welcome screen - that
> might be less confusing for your visiting users and would help to direct
> them to the Visitor account instead.
>
> --
> Sharon F
> MS-MVP ~ Windows XP Shell/User