Accessing my drives from afar?

[pdpfilms]

Howdy-
I'm looking to be able to access my drives remotely, from outside my home network. What's the best way to do this? My setup is such:

A G5, OSX 10.4.8, with multiple internal and external drives to be accessed, connected to home network

A Powerbook, OSX 10.4.8, running on an outside network, used to access the drives.

Is there a solution to to be able to do this from any computer, without using software like MyPC, or something similar? I feel like there should be a way to do this within OSX using FTP or something similar. Oh, and the more step-by-step the explanation, the better. I'm not so great at this whole networking thing. Thanks.

 

[26139]

yes

So you just want to access the files but not actually control the computer, correct?

First, what kind of router do you have?

 

[pdpfilms]

Yeah, looking to just access the drives.

i'm running an Airport Extreme.

 

[MrSmith]

Don't know anything about networking, but a drive connected to a machine is presumably the same as a hard disk inside the machine. If so, then File Sharing across the Internet is easy in OS X. I connect to my machine at home, open a Finder window for it, and drag 'n' drop. All you need is the IP address for the other machine (which you can see in Networking in Sys Prefs).

Finder > Go > Connect To Server and enter the IP address.

 

[26139]

Answer...

Go to sys prefs, sharing and then check FTP access.

Then click on Network, TCP/IP and note your IP address (or just copy it).

If you're running on DHCP (assume you are) then open up airport admin utility and sign into your extreme. Click internet, change the DHCP lease to 999 hours and then head to port mapping.

You want to forward port 21 (both top and bottom) and enter your IP (or just the last three digits) and then apply.

NEXT, after the router finishes rebooting, open a browser and head to www.whatismyip.com. Write that number down. When you're away from your house, go to the Finder, Go>Connect to server and type in ftp://xxx.xxx.xxx.xx (your IP address).

Cool?

 

[MrSmith]

appleretailguy, you obviously know what you're talking about, but how is your procedure different (better) than the one I use? (Don't know if it's relevant, but the IP address changes for my Nifty.com account at home so I have to write the IP address down before I go to work each day.)

 

[pdpfilms]

Go to sys prefs, sharing and then check FTP access.

Then click on Network, TCP/IP and note your IP address (or just copy it).

If you're running on DHCP (assume you are) then open up airport admin utility and sign into your extreme. Click internet, change the DHCP lease to 999 hours and then head to port mapping.

You want to forward port 21 (both top and bottom) and enter your IP (or just the last three digits) and then apply.

NEXT, after the router finishes rebooting, open a browser and head to www.whatismyip.com. Write that number down. When you're away from your house, go to the Finder, Go>Connect to server and type in ftp://xxx.xxx.xxx.xx (your IP address).

Cool?

Cool.

Only thing is, when I do this, it asks for a username and password to connect to the ip address. I enter my username and password, and it only mounts my home folder. How do i get it to load all mounted drives?

 

[26139]

Um...

appleretailguy, you obviously know what you're talking about, but how is your procedure different (better) than the one I use? (Don't know if it's relevant, but the IP address changes for my Nifty.com account at home so I have to write the IP address down before I go to work each day.)

Might you be directly connected to your modem? Or port 21 might automatically be open on your network.

 

[pdpfilms]

I can't seem to get anywhere on this one...

All files in my home folder are read only as well. making aliases to my other drives and placing them in my home folder doesn't work, neither does making aliases to specific folders within those drives. I'm completely lost.

 

[MrSmith]

Might you be directly connected to your modem? Or port 21 might automatically be open on your network.

Sorry, 'ports' and such are beyond me. All I know is I check my mail and read the news, etc., on my machine at home each morning, then before I leave I open Sys Prefs > Network and note the IP address and mail it to work (because it changes every day). I don't turn the machine off, or put it to sleep. When I get to work I do Go > Connect to Server and enter that IP address. It asks for my login(?) name and password for the home computer (or I can sign in as 'guest', but I don't know what that means. Read only, maybe.). I am then asked if I want to connect to my home folder or the hard disk itself. That's it. It's mounted on my machine until I unmount it.