How to Share Files between Windows and Linux

We have covered in one of our articles already how to share a folder and access it from another Windows system. In this guide, I will show you how to share a folder in Windows for access from a Linux machine. I will use Ubuntu Linux here, but the steps shown will work on other distributions like Debian and Linux Mint too.

Share a File from Windows

Step 1. Right-click the folder you would like to share and click Properties.

Step 2. Open the sharing tab and click Advanced Sharing.

Step 3. Check the 'share this folder' box and click on Permissions.

Step 4. Choose everyone to give full control (You can give read or write permissions only, it depends on your requirements).

Step 5. Click OK.

Step 6. Open the security tab and click Edit.

Step 7. Click Add and search everyone. Click OK on all the open windows. Your folder is shared and it is now accessible on the Linux computer.

If you are working on Windows command line, take a look here at how to find folders to share.

Access the Windows Share from Linux

Step 1. Open the terminal and execute the following command to install cifs-utils package (on Ubuntu and Debian).

sudo apt-get install cifs-utils

Step 2. Make a directory and mount the share by executing the following command on the terminal.

mkdir ~/Desktop/Windows-Share sudo mount.cifs //WindowsPC/Share /home/geek/Desktop/Windows-Share -o user=geek