Connecting to shared folder on Windows Server Problem

Hi,

I have a strange issue that I was hoping someone could shed some light on.

I am using my MBP on a windows network at my new work place.

I have connected to a number of shared drives on the server (that you would map a drive and assign a letter in windows) as volumes on the Mac.

I have then created an alias to those and given the alias a letter (everyone at the company refers to each as a letter because of windows) ie the 'X' drive. Just makes it easier to know it as that.

So I have:

//server1/test - alias created is called (X: on server1)
//server2/folder - alias created is called (W: on server2)
//server1/another - alias created is called (Y: on server1)

Problem is there are 2 different servers with the same shared folder name and this causes an issue:

//server1/folder - alias created is called (W: on server1)
//server2/folder - alias created is called (Z: on server1)

I want these to have 2 separate alias's but if I create the connection to the first one, all is fine. I then create a connection to the second and the other one I have just created now points to the new one and I don't have a connection to the older one. If I create 2 different alias's, both alias's will point to the most recent connection out of the two.

This means everytime I need to connect to the 'other' server that isn't currently connected, I will have to manually set up the connection and will loose the other one.

Sorry for the long post but it's a weird problem and I want to get it fixed as it isn't helping my case for staying on my Mac and being forced over to Windows.

I haven't got much info but one is Windows Server 2003 and other is 2008. I am on 10.6

I'm a little confused by your examples:

//server1/test - alias created is called (X: on server1)
//server2/folder - alias created is called (W: on server2)
//server1/another - alias created is called (Y: on server1)

Problem is there are 2 different servers with the same shared folder name and this causes an issue:

//server1/folder - alias created is called (W: on server1)
//server2/folder - alias created is called (Z: on server1)

Click to expand...

You can't map the same letter to Windows shares, also the last one says server2 but then says it's on server 1.....

Any given server on your network will have a unique name/path to which an alias can be created.

This is of little help I know.... but I can't really understand the issue your having

Correct. Your Aliases will have the name of your Share. No offense but the reason for Share names is to be unique.

Having ten servers with a share name of Shared is a bad idea even if in Windows you can map them as ten different letters to differentiate them.

In OS X you have the Shared section of the Finder window which lists the hostname of the computers on the network. Once connected they will have an eject symbol next to them. Select the hostname to see the shares you have access to. If they are mounted they will have eject symbols as well.

I have connected to several servers on a network to D$ and on the desktop there are four aliases called D$ with no obvious way to tell which alias is which server. However using the Shared section of the Finder window does help in that regard. Again having shares with the same name is certainly harder to manage.

If you are simply having issues connecting to the same share name on two different servers then I have no idea what the problem could be because I know it to be possible and not a limitation of the OS.

Thanks for the replies, sorry I wasn't clear on the shares in the original post. It should be like this:

//server1/test - alias created is called (X: on server1)
//server2/folder - alias created is called (W: on server2)
//server1/another - alias created is called (Y: on server1)

Problem is there are 2 different servers with the same shared folder name and this causes an issue:

//server2/folder - alias created is called (W: on server2)
//server1/folder - alias created is called (Z: on server1)

We basically have an Apache server and a Windows server for hosting websites and a shared folder on each of those called 'websites'

//server1/websites
//server2/websites

When I visit those shares in the 'shared section' of finder I can get into each share fine, but when I then go to the desktop to make an alias of each of those mounted drives, both the alias's point to the same share on one of the servers.

I will end up learning what drive letters associate with which share, but it would be nice to be able to get those alias's working properly.

Is this something anyone has come across before?

Are you creating the Aliases from the /Volumes directory?

I go to the 'shared' section in finder, click on the server, click on the folder within that so

shared -> server1 -> websites

This then connects and creates a 'volume' (sorry if that's the wrong term) on my desktop. I then right click this and create an alias.

Doing this process for each share:

shared -> server1 -> websites
shared -> server2 -> websites

creates 2 different icons on my desktop. Double click on each one gets me to the correct area on the their respective servers. Creating 2 alias's from each one, gives me 2 different alias icons, but they both go to the same server folder.

The reason I want the alias's is that it is easier to place them in a folder, for example, that I can easily access from finder and name them what I want, whereas the volumes that are placed on the desktop don't seem to be accessible via finder.

If it isn't obvious, this is the first time I have tried to connect a mac to a windows network (any network really) so if there is a better way to achieve what I am trying to do any suggestions would be great.

Thanks

Connect to server1, be sure to save credentials in the keychain

Use the Go > Go to Folder option from the Finder

Enter /Volumes click Go

In the new Window there you will see a true alias. Make an alias of the alias, rename it to something appropriate an drag it to wherever you want.

Disconnect from server1

Repeat for server2

Now use the newly created aliases to reconnect you to server1 and server2

Hi,

Thanks for the suggestion but it didn't fix the problem.

Same thing, I create the alias for the first server, disconnect the first server. The alias points to the first server.

I connect the second server, I create an alias, it points to the first server. I now have 2 alias's that I created from 2 different volumes that both go to the same volume when click.

Quite often when I go to //server2/ through the 'shared' in the finder its like it has to re-connect to the server (tho it doesn't ask for user and password). I click on the server name and it hangs and has the loading spinny thing down in bottom right of finder.

Maybe this is the problem, any ideas how I can keep it connected? Or is that it just taking a bit of time to read the contents of the server?

Is it Windows 2008? Mot sure why they are so sluggish with OS X but 2008 servers always seem to take their sweet time for connecting from Finder.

Are you the admin?

Can you connect to smb://server1/D$ (or C$ if that's the case)?

Do you get the same issue?

What about smb://IPADDRESS/Sharename

Also, Get Info on both shares. Is the creation/modification date/time the same for both? We had an issue - oh I guess about 10 years ago? - where our corporate shares were conflicting with one another because of similar file names - but changing the names didn't resolve it completely. We found that the units were being given the same modification/creation dates from our backup software and that information was confusing our Macs. I would think this bug would be resolved by now, but you never know.

I have the same issue: 2 different Windows 2003 servers with the same share name (e.g. Common). This caused major trouble for Excel. When trying to open a file on the named share and server1, Excel lost its way and tried to open the file from server2, where it doesn't exist.

My solution is to create a unique named share (e.g. Common-Annex) on server1 and point it to the same directory as the offending share: both share names are available and point to the same directory. The macs can load the Common share from server2 and the Common-Annex share from server1. Eventually, I'll get rid of the original offending Common on server1.