samba - Sep 2000 - guest access

Hello-

I am trying to allow anyone to access a particular directory on a Linux
box.  Chances are they are going to be a Windows user which will not be
a Unix user that has been added on said box.  That is, the Linux box
will have no idea who they are.  In smb.conf there is the line:

# Uncomment this if you want a guest account, you must add this to
/etc/passwd
# otherwise the user "nobody" is used
  guest account = pcguest

which I have uncommented.  Not clear on what they mean by 'must add this
to /etc/passwd'  after all the whole point is we don't know what the
user OR password is up front.

Anyone know what I need to do to allow anyone to connect and have access
to a particular public directory.

Thanks,
Peter Bouton

> -----Original Message-----
> From: samba-admin@us4.samba.org [mailto:samba-admin@us4.samba.org]On
> Behalf Of Peter Bouton
> Sent: Wednesday, September 20, 2000 5:46 PM
> To: Samba
> Subject: guest access
>
>
> # Uncomment this if you want a guest account, you must add this to
> /etc/passwd
> # otherwise the user "nobody" is used
>   guest account = pcguest
>
> which I have uncommented.  Not clear on what they mean by 'must add
this
> to /etc/passwd'  after all the whole point is we don't know what
the
> user OR password is up front.
I'm a bit new at this myself, but I believe what they're saying is that
"pcguest" needs to be a valid user on your Unix box.


---
Mark Roedel             |  "Blessed is he who has learned to laugh
Systems Programmer      |   at himself, for he shall never cease
LeTourneau University   |   to be entertained."
Longview, Texas, USA    |                           -- John Powell

I have been trying to get guest access to a share. 

My smb.conf is as follows...

[global]
        workgroup = DEVSPACE
        encrypt passwords = yes

[test]
        comment = my first share
        path = /home/temp
        read only = no
        guest ok = yes
        browseable = yes
        public = yes
        guest account = nobody

Then on one windows station I execute net view pluto and it works 
because the user that does the net view has been added to the smb.conf file.

Then on another windows station I execute net view pluto and I get 
System error 5 has occured Access is denied because the user that is 
accessing the server is not known as a user on the network.  The user 
nobody has been added to the smb.conf file.  If I attempt to connect to 
the network share directly using net use x: \\pluto\test I get an error 
because it asks me for a user.

I looked at the documentation and have tweaked all the combinations of 
the setting guest ok to yes and no and to setting of public to yes and 
no.  Nothing seems to let the unknown user onto the machine.  Both 
Windows boxes are running W2K.

Thanks

Christian Gross