Friday 30 January, 2004

Windows networking is easy

Getting two Windows XP computers to communicate is as easy as just plug them into the same hub, makes sure they are in the same workgroup and off you go. Er, no, it didn't seem to last night. I have of course all my data and software set up on my old computer, and I wanted to get the moved across to the new one. And spent next three hours trying to figure out why they couldn't communicate.

  • They could both access the internet (so hardware was ok)
  • They had unique names and were in the same workgroup
  • Router had unique IP addresses assigned to them

Still, they couldn't connect, or even ping each other. I spent good two hours googling trying to find anyone with similar problems, but apparently XP networking is ridiculously simple. And then it hit me while watching some lucha libre (Dragon insisted that if I don't think about it for a while, the answer will come to me, and he was right) - surely the personal firewalls I have installed on my computers know the difference between the local network and the internet?

Turns out they do. As long as you tell them it's allowed. That was one of those moments when I would have felt very stupid if I hadn't been so glad I figured it out in the end.

Posted by kolibri at 30 January 09:45, 2004
Comments
# 1 - Rel Fexive (on January 30, 2004 10:50 AM):

XP can sometimes be very stupid. I think it's all the wizards...


# 2 - Kolibri (on January 30, 2004 10:57 AM):

Agreed, although in this case it wasn't really XP's fault. I use Norton Firewall (as opposed to ZoneAlarm, which I've had nothing but trouble with), and it needs to be told that other computers in your network are trusted.


# 3 - J-Ko (on January 30, 2004 11:01 AM):

Well, good, since XP firewall is not really a firewall...


# 4 - Kolibri (on January 30, 2004 11:08 AM):

I find it scary that they even call it that! It really lulls some people into false sense of security...


# 5 - Rel Fexive (on January 31, 2004 11:26 AM):

I did use ZoneAlarm for ages with absolutely no problems. Now I have Norton Internet Security... and that immediately caught me with it's advert blocking, which stopped me from looking at one of my webmails. Now I use the pop-up blocking in the Google toolbar to stop them instead.

...

Well, wasn't *that* facinating? :>


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