Arch Linux

jammer

Member

Registered: 2020-10-10

Posts: 15

Sharing files over network (Linux/Windows)

How do people generally share files between Linux / Windows machines? I know there are bunch of options (such as SMB, NFS, Webdav, FTP, SFTP), but which one to choose?

Some criteria to consider:
+Speed being the biggest concern (both big files and lot of small files)
+Ease of use
+Being able to mount in both Windows and Linux
+Specifically looking for LAN solution, but being usable over VPN is bonus
-Ease of installation/configuration is not essential
-Mac support is nice, but not needed

Especially interested if there are some modern solutions I haven't heard of?

sipak

Member

Registered: 2019-02-03

Posts: 50

Re: Sharing files over network (Linux/Windows)

I think it really varies and depends on what people are used to.

Does the share has to be read and write?
If read only, I would spawn a darkhttpd /home/john/public
You then access the files via any web browser on any OS, and works on VPN since you just point to the machine IP. Could even setup a simply website or auth or something.

For read/write, I would use SSH. sftp(ftp over ssh), works fine with winscp or filezilla on Windows, and it is native to linux and mac.
If your objective is to synchronize, syncthing does a great job and works on all those three OS.
If bidirectional, read/write sharing

---

A problem to do what everybody else does without questioning. A danger to go against the way things are just because. Too much or too little, ivory towers of perfection or functional mess... Balance is what this world needs. Selective, not the middle ground. Objectivity and idealism, but within a pragmatic scope. - Minimalism is achieved through efficiency, not deficiency.

seth

Member

From: Won't reply 2 private help req

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 75,177

Re: Sharing files over network (Linux/Windows)

nb. that NFS, FTP and **especially** SMB are not acceptable in hostile environments.
Also

Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway.

Ie. depending on the network quality and geographical distance, an external USB3 SSD might actually yield the best throughput (latency is probably higher )

Next to that and wrt performance and depending on the actual scenario, sth. utilizing delta copies (like rsync) can have a drastically higher impacts than any protocol decisions.

The easiest solution on windows will likely be SMB, afaik NFS is actually restricted to server versions.
If the connection is ad-hoc/unstable/transient I'd opt for userspace implementations (kio/gio and there're fuse mount implementations for smb and nfs) over kernel modules.
s/ftp and webdav inherently not being affected here.
They will cost you cpu performance, but add robustness/invariance - esp. nfs is designed as "hard disk that just happens to be connected via ethernet".

---

How to upload text · How to boot w/o GUI · Disable Windows Fast-Start! · Fix your xinitrc

sipak

Member

Registered: 2019-02-03

Posts: 50

Re: Sharing files over network (Linux/Windows)

FTP must die. Never use FTP. Don't mention its name. IANA should revoke ports 20 and 21.
https://mywiki.wooledge.org/FtpMustDie

---

A problem to do what everybody else does without questioning. A danger to go against the way things are just because. Too much or too little, ivory towers of perfection or functional mess... Balance is what this world needs. Selective, not the middle ground. Objectivity and idealism, but within a pragmatic scope. - Minimalism is achieved through efficiency, not deficiency.