Managing Network Shares

The Shares page allows you to manage all network shares on the CTERA Edge Filer, both for content that is synced with a CTERA Portal and content that is only available locally.

To define a network share:

1. In the Configuration view, select Shares > Shares in the navigation pane.
   The Shares page is displayed.
   

2. Click New Share.
   The Select a Folder to Share window is displayed.
   

3. Drill-down to display the volumes and folders on the edge filer and select the volume, folder, or subfolder on which you want to define the share.
   

   • To create a new subfolder to select as a nested share, select the parent folder, click New Folder, and then assign the subfolder a name.
   • You can define nested shares based on subfolders within the own cloud drive, which are available to users based on the permissions defined when creating the share. If the share has NT ACL settings, these settings are applied to the nested share and to every share below this share. For example, if the administrator has a personal cloud drive named MyGateway, to which he migrated a full old Windows File Server with the following structure:

     /Cloud
         /WIN-File-Server
               /Share1
               /Share2
         /My Files
         /Shared with me
     

     If, before the Windows File Server migration, \\Win-File-Server\Share1 and \\Win-File-Server\Share2 shares were exposed in the old file server, users logged in to MyGateway can access the content of the shares: \\MyGateway\Share1 and \\MyGateway\Share2 after they are defined:

     Share1 = \\MyGateway\Cloud\WIN-File-Server\Share1
     Share2 = \\MyGateway\Cloud\WIN-File-Server\Share2
     

4. Click Next and then assign the network share a name.
   

5. Click Next and choose through which sharing protocols to expose this share.
   
   Windows File Sharing is checked by default and cannot be deselected. From the drop-down, select one of these access levels for the share:

   • Windows ACL Emulation Mode – The share will be a Windows ACL emulation mode share.
     Users access the shared files and folders through standard Windows client computers; for example, using Windows File Explorer through the SMB access provided by the CTERA Edge Filer.
     Windows ACL Emulation Mode also allows you to block users from writing specific file types into the CTERA Edge Filer share or gaining control of the content located on it.
     To copy the files with their ACLs to the CTERA Edge Filer, see Copying Files From an External File Server to the CTERA Edge Filer.
   • Only Authenticated Users – Users will be required to authenticate using their CTERA Edge Filer user name and password, in order to access the network share.
     

   For more information, see Configuring Windows File Sharing.
   Client Side Caching – Server files are designated for off-line work so that a copy of the files is cached on the client computer and can be accessed when the client is off line in exactly the same way as if they were stored on the Windows file server.

   • Automatic caching for documents – A copy of the files is cached automatically.
   • Disabled – The client computer cannot cache files locally and the updated copy must be retrieved from the file server.
   • Manual caching for documents – Users must cache files manually.

6. Specify how you want to share the files.
   FTP – Users will be able to access and download files on this share from the FTP site. To configure the FTP server, go to Shares > FTP Server.

7. Click Next.
   The Block File Types window is displayed.
   

8. Check Enable Blocking File Extensions to block file extensions.
   Enter the file extensions per user and group:

   1. In the Local Users drop-down list, select one of the following:
      Local Users – Search the users defined locally on the CTERA Edge Filer.
      Domain domain Users – Search the users belonging to the domain called domain.
      Local Groups – Search the user groups defined locally on the CTERA Edge Filer.
      Domain domain Groups – Search the user groups belonging to the domain called domain.
   2. In the Quick Search field, type a string that is displayed anywhere within the name of the user or user group you want to add, or click ... to list the users.
      A list of users or user groups matching the search string is displayed.
   3. Select the user or user group in the table.
      The user or user group is added to the list of users and user groups for who, you want to block some file extensions.
   4. For each user and user group, click in the Extensions field, and then specify the extensions to block, with each extension separated by a comma (,). List only the letters of each file extension. For example, to block EXE files, list the exe file extension; to block PDF files, list the pdf file extension. To block both EXE and PDF files, list them as exe,pdf. Blocked extensions are not case sensitive.
      Wildcards (for example, *.exe) are not supported.

9. Click Next.
   The NFS (UNIX File Sharing) window is displayed.
   

   Note

   The NFS mount path for the share, when NFS access is enabled, is displayed.

10. Check the Enable NFS Access option to enable NFS clients to access the share. Both NFS versions 3 and 4 protocols are supported, depending on the protocol used by the client.
    Either, click New to configure each client to which you want to grant access. A row is displayed in the table:

    1. Enter the client's IP address in the Host field and the netmask in the Netmask field.
    2. Select the permitted level of access to the network share via NFS. Options are None, Read Only, or Read/Write.

    Or,
    Click Remove and then select the client's IP address to remove the client from the list.

11. Click Next and set which users can access this network share.
    

    1. In the Local Users drop-down list, select one of the following:
       Local Users – Search the users defined locally on the CTERA Edge Filer.
       Domain domain Users – Search the users belonging to the domain called domain.
       Local Groups – Search the user groups defined locally on the CTERA Edge Filer.
       Domain domain Groups – Search the user groups belonging to the domain called domain.
    2. In the Quick Search field, type a string that is displayed anywhere within the name of the user or user group you want to add, or click ... to list the users.
       A list of users or user groups matching the search string is displayed.
    3. Select the user or user group in the table.
       The user or user group is added to the list of users and user groups who should have access to the network share.
    4. For each user and user group, click in the Permission field, and then select the access level from the drop-down list.

12. Click Next and then Finish to complete the wizard.

Copying Files From an External File Server to the CTERA Edge Filer

To copy individual shares from a file server, use the procedure described in Migrating Shares. You can also perform a delta migration when you previously set up the migration, as described in Completing a Migration and Performing a Delta Migration.

Modifying Shares

Select the share and click Edit Share. Proceed as for defining a new network share.

Removing Shares

Select the share, click Remove Share and then Yes to confirm. This removes the share from the volume or folder it was defined on.