[Vpn-help] Browsing Windows Network Shares

[Matthew Grooms]

Markus Stockhausen wrote:
> Hallo everybody.
> 
> I'm very happy to have finished a VPN Setup with the (fabulous)
> Shrew VPN Client and a Juniper Netscreen SSG-140 using Certificates
> and XAuth. Everything runs like a charm on my Windows PC (DNS,
> Routing, ...). But there is one thing left I cannot get to work:
> Browsing of Network Shares. At the moment I end up with getting
> the Logon Screen displayed and I enter my username and password and
> afterwards the system hangs.
> 
> I tried to supply the DNS/WINS IP addresses in the client
> directly and everything I suspect to be not provided by the
> Firewall device. I'm quite stuck and do not know what type of
> debug output I could provide to narrow down the reaseon of this
> problem.
> 
> Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance.
> 

Markus,

I'm not sure how feasible this is, but have you tried accessing the 
windows network share from within the same network ( not over the VPN )? 
The reason I ask is that I sometimes have problems doing this myself 
depending on the difference between the OS versions and computer ID 
settings ( workgroup names, domain memberships, etc ... ). I assume you 
can resolve the remote host via WINS or you wouldn't be getting the 
authentication dialog popup. Seeing this dialog mostly proves the WINS 
resolution and IPsec communications is working as intended.

One of the tools you can use is nbtstat -c to list the WINS resolver 
cache. If you see the host you are attempting to connect with, then the 
host name was resolved correctly via WINS.  I just ran some regression 
tests with the Shrew Soft client and was able to successfully browse a 
windows share between 2 XP hosts across a VPN connection. I am using 
samba as the WINS server though so this may not be a complete apples to 
apples comparison. Sorry I can't be more help.

Thanks,

-Matthew