How to Install Samba on macOS

This tutorial will guide you through the steps to install Samba on macOS. Samba is an open-source software that allows file and printer sharing between systems running Linux and Windows.

Step 1: Install Homebrew

Homebrew is a popular package manager for macOS. We will use it to install Samba in this tutorial.

To install Homebrew, open Terminal and enter the following command:

$ /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

Step 2: Install Samba

Once Homebrew is installed, use the following command to install Samba:

$ brew install samba

Step 3: Configure Samba

After installing Samba, you will need to configure it to share files and printers on your network.

1. Open the /usr/local/etc/smb.conf configuration file in a text editor of your choice. Note that you may have to create the file if it does not exist.

$ sudo nano /usr/local/etc/smb.conf

2. Add the following lines to the configuration file to enable file sharing:

[global]
workgroup = WORKGROUP
server string = Samba Server %v
netbios name = macOS
security = user
map to guest = bad user
dns proxy = no

[share]
path = /Users/Shared
browseable = yes
writable = yes
guest ok = yes

In the above example, we have created a share named share that maps to the Shared folder located in the Users directory.

3. Save the changes to the smb.conf configuration file.

Step 4: Start Samba

You can start Samba by running the following command:

$ sudo brew services start samba

Step 5: Access Samba Share

You can now access the Samba share from another computer on your local network.

1. Open a file explorer on the other computer and navigate to the network folder.

2. You should see the name of your macOS computer and the share you created listed.

3. Click on the share name to access the contents of the shared folder.

Congratulations! You have successfully installed and configured Samba on macOS.

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