Sams Teach Yourself Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional in 10 Minutes

By Dorothy Burke and Jane Calabria

• Table of Contents
  • Copyright
  • Tell Us What You Think!
  • About the Authors
  • Introduction
  • Conventions Used in This Book
  • Lesson 1. Navigating Windows 2000 Professional
  • Lesson 2. Working with a Window
  • Lesson 3. Using Menus
  • Lesson 4. Using Windows 2000 Professional Help
  • Lesson 5. Using Dialog Boxes
  • Lesson 6. Working with Multiple Windows and Applications
  • Lesson 7. Copying, Moving, and Linking Between Windows and Applications
  • Lesson 8. Using My Computer
  • Lesson 9. Managing Files with My Computer
  • Lesson 10. Using WordPad
  • Lesson 11. Understanding File Properties and the Recycle Bin
  • Lesson 12. Printing
  • Lesson 13. Using My Network Places
  • Lesson 14. Using the Control Panel
  • Lesson 15. Using Outlook Express Mail
  • Lesson 16. Sharing Workstations and Setting Passwords
    • Assigning Passwords to Screen Savers
    • Changing Your Password
    • Sharing Resources on Your Computer
    • Sharing Folders and Disk Drives on Your Computer
    • Setting File Permissions
    • Creating and Sharing a Printer
    • Sharing an Already-Defined Printer
    • Setting Printer Permissions
  • Lesson 17. Using Internet Explorer 5
  • Lesson 18. Web Site and Document Searching
  • Lesson 19. Troubleshooting, Restarting, and Disaster Planning
  • Lesson 20. Customizing the Windows 2000 Environment

Sharing Resources on Your Computer

Most files on your computer are probably applicable only to you and your work. However, some of your files may be useful to your co-workers. Windows allows you to share files (or, more precisely, disk drives and folders) and, later, to stop sharing them. In addition, while there may be printers on your network designated as shared printers, you may have a printer connected to your computer. Windows permits you to share (and stop sharing) your printer with your co-workers as well.

When you share a resource, you can specify who has access to it and what degree of access they have. Once you have shared a resource, other users have access to it as long as it remains shared and the computer on which it resides is online. When you share a disk drive, you share all folders and files on it as well.

When you share a folder, you share all files in it, all folders in it, and all files and folders in its subfolders. You can, however, revoke or limit access to a subfolder by creating a share of that subfolder with more limited permissions than the share of the higher level folder. When you share a folder, two users can open the file at the same time, but only the first person to open the file can open it in read/write mode. The second person to open the file opens it in read mode only.

For example, you could share a folder called Data and give read and write permission to the files in it. Connecting users could then read the files in that folder and its subfolders as well as add other files, edit files, and delete files. If you wanted to limit access to a subfolder called Personal, you could share that folder and grant lesser permissions. For example, you could grant only a read permission, in which case connecting users could not add new files to the directory, edit, or delete existing files. Or you could grant only a no access permission, in which case connecting users would be entirely locked out of the files in the folder. In this case, you are really not sharing the folder at all with those users but, rather, revoking at the level of the Personal folder the share that you granted at the higher level of the Data folder.

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